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f  s|imul  ani  t\t  C|urt| 


BY 

LEWIS   CHEESEMAN,  D.D. 


PHILADELPHIA: 
PARRY    AND    MCMILLAN, 

SUCCESSOKS  TO  A.  HAKT,  late  CAREY  &  HART. 
1856. 


Entered  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  lS56,by 

PARRY   &   MCMILLAN, 

the  Clerk's  Office  of  the  District  Court  of  the  United  States  in  and 
for  the  Eastern  District  of  Pennsylvania. 


STEREOTYPED   BY  L.   JOHNSON  AND   CO. 

PHILADELPHIA. 

PRINTED  EY  T.  K.  &  P.  G.  COLLINS. 


PREFACE. 


In  introducing  the  following  work  to  the  pub- 
lic, an  answer  to  the  following  questions  may  be 
justly  expected: — 

"What  is  the  subject  of  which  it  treats  ? 

What  call  is  there  for  such  a  treatise  at  this 
time  ? 

What  range  has  been  taken,  and  what  method 
adopted,  in  treating  it  ? 

In  the  title,  "Ishmael  and  the  Church,"  is  con- 
tained a  short  and  comprehensive  reply  to  the 
first  question.  This  is  the  text  of  the  discourse, — 
the  thread  that  ties  all  its  several  parts  together. 

Ishmael  has  ever  "  dwelt  in  the  presence  of  all 
his  brethren,"  and  his  fortunes  aud  those  of  the 
church  have  been  remarkably  blended  from  first 
to  last.  They  cross  each  other's  track  in  the 
patriarch's  tent,  in  the  visions  of  the  prophets, 
in  the  creed  of  Mohammed,  in  the  empires  of  the 
Saracens  and  Ottomans;  so  that  in  treating  of 
Ishmael  and  his  descendants  we  necessarily  fol- 
low them  through  the  church;  for  here  their 
way  lies.     With  its  affairs  they  have  ever  inter- 


IV  PREFACE. 

meddled,  and  on  its  changeful  and  suffering  des- 
tiny they  have  ever  left  the  deep  impressions  of 
their  power.  Such,  then,  is  our  theme :— "  Ishmael 
and  the  Church." 

Such  a  work  as  this  is  demanded  by  the  stir- 
ring events  of  our  own  times,— a  portable  volume, 
accessible  to  all,  comprehending  succinctly  "Is- 
lamism"  in  its  origin,  uses,  progress,  and  end.  It 
should  be  examined  in  the  light  of  prophecy  as 
well  as  of  history,  and  thus  made  to  appear  what  it 
truly  is,— a  creation  of  Providence,  subserving  its 
ends  and  illustrative  of  its  wonders  and  its  ways. 
For  such  a  volume  the  way  seems  to  be  now  open. 
It  will  fill  a  space  occupied  by  no  other. 

We  are  to  bear  in  mind,  also,  the  present  ano- 
malous condition  of  Turkey.  Her  disappearance 
from  Europe  and  the  appropriation  of  her  soil  by 
the  Western  Powers  are  events  regarded  as  im- 
minent. She  is  a  bone  of  contention, — a  centre  on 
which  questions  of  war  and  peace  hinge, — a  gate- 
way to  most  momentous  social,  political,  and  re- 
ligious changes. 

A  bare  glance  at  these  facts  will  suggest  at  once 
that  such  a  theme  is  necessarily  invested  with  a 
present  interest,  and,  if  rightly  treated,  must 
prove  highly  acceptable  to  the  reading  public. 

Indeed,  would  we  understand  "the  Italian 
question,"  the  policies  and  necessities  of  cabinets 
and  princes,  this  subject  needs  first  to  be  studied 
and  comprehended.  Dark  problems  with  respect 
to  the  future  will  receive  by  this  means  a  probable 


PREFACE.  V 

solution,  and  remote  and  otherwise  unperceived 
causes  will  be  seen  to  have  attained  a  controlling 
maturity,  and  helpless  nations  to  be  afloat  upon  a 
sea  wbose  resistless  surges  carry  them  where  they 
will  not. 

Political  questions  have  their  religious  aspects. 
These  belong  to  the  divine,  and  fall  within  the 
range  of  his  appropriate  studies.  The  questions 
that  now  agitate  Europe  are  essentially  religious. 
Religion  underlies  all  its  policies  and  impulses ; 
and  hence  the  religious  sympathies  of  the  various 
parties  in  the  strifes  of  princes  are  all  the  more 
important  to  be  understood.  It  is  one  design  of 
this  work  to  make  these  palpable* 

As  to  the  range  taken,  it  is  wide.  The  rela- 
tions of  Ishmael  to  the  church,  and  his  influence 
on  its  destinies,  from  the  days  of  the  patriarch  to 
the  fall  of  the  Ottomans,  are  comprehended  in  it. 
The  lead  of  the  prophets  has  been  followed,  and 
history  is  expanded  just  where  the  prophets  pause 
and  make  it  necessary — -just  wThere  after  an  inter- 
val of  centuries  they  point  out  some  new  centre  of 
influence,  that,  springing  up  irresistibly,  changes 
the  entire  course  of  events ;  or  just  where,  the 
crescent  crossing  into  the  plane  of  the  church,  an 
adorable  Providence  becomes  conspicuous  in  the 
use  that  it  makes  of  this  formidable  power  in 
compassing  its  ends. 

This  has  made  the  line  of  the  true  church,  as 
distinguished  from  the  false,  an  important  object 
of  interest  and  search.     It  has  hence  been  care- 


Vi  PREFACE. 

fully  eliminated  and  traced  from  Asia  and  Africa 
to  Europe  and  America. 

It  has  also  made  the  "  Testament  of  Moham- 
med," and  the  consequent  protection  of  persecuted 
disciples  by  the  Saracens,  the  subject  of  special 
inquiry  and  elucidation.  The  aggressions  of  the 
Turks  in  Asia, — the  Crusades,  and  their  favour- 
able effects  on  the  church  left  behind  in  Europe, 
—the  fall  of  the  Eastern  capital,— the  desirable 
results  accruing  from  that  event,  and  the  indirect 
though  real  protection  of  the  Keformation  of  the 
sixteenth  century,  arising  from  the  military  ardour 
and  successes  of  Solyman  the  Great, — come  also 
under  review ;  and,  throughout,  the  ways  of  Provi- 
dence are  made  obvious,  and  our  confidence  in  its 
integrity  and  wisdom  becomes  revived  and  con- 
firmed. 

As  to  method,  history  has  been  relied  on  for 
facts,  and  the  Divine  testimony  for  evidence  that 
those  facts  were  arranged  by  Providence  to  fulfil 
its  purposes. 

The  work  has  been  prepared  for  the  Protestant 
world,  and  care  has  been  taken  not  to  offend 
against  its  denominational  preferences.  If  the 
author  has  succeeded  in  making  himself  useful 
to  the  church  of  our  common  Master,  it  will 
be  his  sufficient  reward. 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 

Chap.  I. — Ishmael  in  his  Youth 17 

II. — Ishmael  in  the  Wilderness 22 

III. — The  Comprehensive  Nationality  of  Ish- 
mael   SO 

IV.— His  Evil  Destiny..... 36 

V. — The  Nationality  of  Ishmael  obtaining  De- 
velopment in  Mohammed 41 

VI. — Ishmael  and  Mohammed. — Continued....  50 

VII. — The  Secret  of  Mohammed's  Success 58 

VIII. — Islamism  a  Perversion  of  Christianity....  66 

IX. — The  Saracens — Their  Fanatic  Courage. ...  72 

X. — Mohammed  and  his  Successors 82 

XI. — The  Saracens,  a  Scourge  to  Christendom  89 
XII. — The  Saracens,  a  Scourge  to  Christendom. 

— Continued 96 

XIII.— Mohammed  protecting  the  True  Church  : 

The  Nestorians 99 

XIV. — Mohammed  protecting  the  True  Church  : 

The  Paulicians 109 

XV. — Mohammed  protecting  the  True  Church : 

The  Philadelphians 117 

XVI. — Mohammed  protecting  the  True  Church: 

The  Albigenses 130 


vii 


Vlll  CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

Chap.  XVIL— Founding  of  Bagdad  the  End  of  the 

Prophetic  Months 134 

XVIII. — The  Contrast  between  Christ  and  Mo- 
hammed    137 

XIX. — The  Saracenic  merged  in  the  Ottoman 

Empire 148 

XX.— The  Crusades— Their  Causes  and  Ends  158 
XXI.— Peter  Waldo  on  the  Track  of  Peter  the 

Hermit 169 

XXII. — Constantinople  menaced 175 

XXIIL— The  Fall  of  Constantinople 185 

XXIV.—  The  Mission  of  Ishmael  one  of  Strife  194 
XXV. — The  Providential  Warning  disregarded  197 
XXVI.— The  Antecedents  of  the  Reformation .  201 
XXVIL— The  Art  of  Printing  and  the  Reforma- 
tion   213 

XXVIII.— The  Art  of  Printing  and  the  Reforma- 
tion.— Continued 222 

XXIX. — The  Discovery  of  America,  and   the 

Reformation 234 

XXX. — Islamism  and  the  Reformation 240 

XXXI. — Islamism  and  the  Reformation. — Con- 
tinued    254 

XXXII. — The  Witnesses  not  slain 265 

XXXIII. — Ishmael  and  the  Western  Allies 281 

XXXIV.— Rome — Her  Aspirations 292 

XXXV.— The  Fall  of  Islamism 299 

XXXVI. — Isaac's  Patrimony  restored 313 


ISHMAEL  AND  THE  CHURCH, 


CHAPTER  I. 

ISHxMAEL  IN   HIS  YOUTH. 

"  I  see  a  mighty  arm,  by  man  unseen, 
Resistless,  not  to  be  controll'd,  that  guides, 
In  solitude  of  unshared  energies, 
All  these  thy  ceaseless  miracles,  0  world !" 

Lamb. 

There  are  extensive  regions  in  Asia,  Africa, 
and  in  the  east  and  south  of  Europe,  in  which 
the  Mohammedan  religion  prevails.  It  is  false, 
intolerant,  and  antichristian.  Instances  there 
are  in  which,  as  in  Roman  Catholic  countries, 
this  intolerance  has  been  for  a  season  inter- 
mitted; but  still,  these  instances  are  exceptions 
to  a  rule  otherwise  universal,  and  cannot  alter 
a  character  inherent  in  the  very  creed  of  the 
false  prophet,  and  traced  in  blood  on  the  pages 
of  history  and  on  the  symbol  of  his  faith. 

According   to    the   traditions    of   Mecca — 

17 


18  [SHMAEL    AND   THE    CHURCH. 

which  are  in  harmony,  on  this  point,  with 
the  intimations  of  the  prophets  of  Zion  — 
Mohammed  sprang  from  the  loins  of  Abraham, 
and  from  the  scoffer  lshmael.  "  It  is  written, 
that  Abraham  had  two  sons,  the  one  by  a  bond- 
maid, the  other  by  a  free  woman.  But  he 
who  was  ot^  the  bondwoman  was  born  after 
the  flesh ;  but  he  oi^  the  free  woman  was  by 
promise.  Which  things  are  an  allegory.  .  .  . 
For  this  Agar  is  Mount  Sinai  in  Arabia,  and 
answereth  to  Jerusalem  which  now  is.  and  is 
in  bondage  with  her  children."  Gal.  iv. 
22-25. 

He  of  the  bondwoman  was  born  after  the 
flesh,  inherited  the  unsanctiiied  nature  oi^  his 
Egyptian  mother,  carried  the  stamp  of  in- 
feriority on  his  brow,  and  cherished  her  en- 
mity to  true  religion  in  his  heart.  Nature, 
true  to  her  laws,  had  carried  down  the  mental 
and  moral  characteristics,  the  physical  tastes, 
and  spiritual  idiosyncrasies,  from  the  mother 
to  the  child.  It  occurred  also  that  Sarah's 
jealousy  imparted  to  her  domestic  rule  a 
severity  difficult  for  unrenewed  humanity  to 
bear,  and  which,  in  the  mind  of  the  irritated 
lshmael.  doubtless  fully  justified  the  bitter  com- 
plainings and  reproaches  of  Hagar.  "  When 
Sarah  dealt  hardly  with  her  she  tied  from  her 


ISHMAEL   IN    HIS  YOUTH.  19 

face :"  Gen.  xvi.  G.  Day  by  day  her  native 
hostility  to  the  patriarch's  faith  received  fresh 
irritation,  and  in  the  recesses  of  the  desert,  in 
her  frequent  communings  with  her  son,  would 
naturally  impress  its  antipathies  deeply  upon 
a  heart  already  under  the  control  of  a  matured 
impiety.  "  It  set  him  in  a  way  that  was  not 
good ;  he  abhorred  not  evil."  Domestic  feuds, 
embodying  so  many  causes  of  enduring  and 
increasing  repulsiveness,  must  reach  their  crisis 
at  last ;  the  parties  will  seek  relief  ultimately 
either  in  the  exercise  of  mutual  forbearance  or 
in  a  voluntary  separation.  The  latter  was  the 
result  in  the  present  instance;  the  aliens  be- 
came outcasts  from  a  home  in  which  the 
mistaken  Ha  gar  had  aspired  to  rise  from  the 
condition  of  a  subordinate  and  a  slave  to  that 
of  a  mistres  -. 

In  the  church,  when  it  was  placed  under 
patriarchal  rule,  the  first-born  son  succeeded, 
at  the  death  of  the  patriarch,  to  his  authority, 
dignity,  and  estates,  and  took,  ordinarily,  his 
honoured  place  as  next  in  the  line  among  the 
illustrious  progenitors  of  the  promised  Messiah. 
Isaac,  the  child  of  promise  and  of  miracle, 
was  correctly  regarded  by  Abraham  as  his 
successor. 

For  years  previously  to  the  birth  of  this 


20  ISHMAEL   AND    TIIE    CHURCH. 

divinely-appointed  rival,  Ishmael  had  occupied 
the  place  and  had  held  in  just  expectancy  the 
coveted  immunities  of  the  first-born, — had  been 
the  accredited  heir;  and,  considering  the  ex- 
treme age  of  his  parent,  there  existed  no 
reasonable  prospect  of  his  being  supplanted 
by  another.  The  patriarch  also,  up  to  the 
time  of  the  predicted  birth  of  Isaac,  had  been 
satisfied  with  this  arrangement ;  had  prayed, 
"Oh  that  Ishmael  might  live  before  thee  !"  nor 
had  he  even  dreamed  of  another.  But,  when 
it  was  said,  "  In  Isaac  shall  thy  seed  be  called,"* 
God  revealed  a  preference  which,  in  its  very 
nature  and  in  the  very  terms  in  which  it  had 
been  conceived,  rejected  Ishmael  from  the 
privileges  of  primogeniture. 

When  the  solemn  yet  joyous  preparations 
for  the  festival  in  which  Isaac  was  to  be 
weaned  and  publicly  recognised  and  installed 
in  the  succession  were  in  progress,  Ishmael  was 
seventeen  years  of  age,  capable  of  comprehend- 
ing the  extent,  at  least,  of  his  earthly  loss, 
and  of  an  humble  and  intelligent  submission 
to  the  known  will  of  heaven ;  but  from  that 
hour  his  rival  became  the  object  of  his  most 
unreasonable  envy  and  resentment. 

*  Gen.  xxi.  12. 


ISHMAEL  IN   HIS   YOUTH.  21 

Cain  rejected  the  same  Lord  on  whom  Abel 
depended  alone  for  salvation.  Ishmael  fol- 
lowed in  the  way  of  Cain.  His  desire  for  the 
patriarchate  terminated  in  its  temporal  advan- 
tages. When  these  were  alienated  in  Isaac,  he 
scorned  the  spiritual  patrimony  and  persecuted 
the  child  of  promise.  Similar  alternate  cha- 
racteristics are  now  discoverable  in  the  fami- 
lies of  the  godly.  Some  betake  themselves  in 
life's  young  day  to  Jesus,  are  seen  in  the  ways 
of  piety,  and  grow  up  in  the  fear  of  the  Lord ; 
others  become  restive  and  desire  to  free  them- 
selves from  the  restraints  of  a  Christian  fire- 
side. Born  after  the  flesh,  they  despise  the 
blessings  of  the  covenant.  Controversies  in 
the  church,  intermarriages  with  unbelievers, 
the  cares  of  the  world  and  the  deceitfulness  of 
riches,  the  very  bread  and  water  which  they 
acquire  and  carry  with  them,  serve  but  to  in- 
crease their  dreary  distance  from  all  succour 
amid  the  spiritual  wastes  that  surround  them. 
Ishmael,  in  a  word,  in  his  rejection  of  his  Lord, 
is  an  allegory,  and  represents  Christ  in  the 
covenant  as  the  uniform  and  chosen  test  of 
human  character,  as  alternately  a  sanctuary 
and  a  rock  of  offence,  "set  for  the  rising  and 
falling  of  many  in  Israel." 


CHAPTER  II. 

ISHMAEL   IN   THE   WILDERNESS. 

"  There  was  in  him  a  vital  scorn  of  all, 
As  if  the  worst  had  fallen  that  could  befall ; 
He  stood  a  stranger  in  this  breathing  world, 
An  erring  spirit  from  another  hurl'd." 

Byron. 

Beersheba  lay  at  the  southern  extremity  of 
the  land  of  Canaan.  Hence,  in  any  descrip- 
tion of  the  country  intended  to  include  its 
entire  area,  Beersheba  was  referred  to  as  the 
extreme  southern  limit.  The  wilderness  of 
Beersheba — sometimes  also  called  the  wilder- 
ness of  Paran — comprehended  a  region  lying 
still  farther  south,  covered  with  low  shrubs 
and  loose  sands.  On  its  southern  division 
rises  abruptly,  from  the  bosom  of  a  vast  and 
thirsty  plain,  the  frowning  battlements  of 
Sinai.  In  this  gloomy  solitude,  far  from  the 
abodes  of  the  godly,  Hagar  and  Ishmael  found 
their  congenial  retreat. 

"Agar  is  Mount  Sinai  in  Arabia."  That 
covenant  of  which  she  is  the  allegory  "gen- 
22 


ISHMAEL   IN   THE   WILDERNESS.  23 

dereth  to  bondage."*  Ishmael  inherited  his 
mother's  nature,  imbibed  her  religious  pre- 
judices, espoused  her  quarrel  against  Sarah, 
met  with  a  rival  in  Isaac,  turned  against  the 
patriarchal  church,  persecuted  the  child  of  pro- 
mise, became  an  outcast;  and  thus,  step  by 
step,  commenced  his  career  of  wo. 

Such  is  the  covenant  of  Sinai.  It  is  one  of 
hardship  and  servitude.  Under  its  rigorous 
workings  is  engendered  the  base  spirit  of  ser- 
vility. Here  the  moral  bondman  toils  for  life 
in  services  in  which  he  has  no  pleasure,  is 
goaded  on  by  curses  that  appal  and  a  con- 
science that  torments  him ;  and  yet  every  step, 
every  change,  is  for  the  worse,  involving  him 
in  ever-increasing  difficulties,  and  widening 
more  and  more  fatally  his  separation  from  the 
blessed  vicinity  of  joy  and  hope. 

Such,  indeed,  is  ever  the  normal  career  of 
unbelief.  Whenever  the  true  Messiah  is  left  or 
scorned,  whichever  plausible  alternative  after 
that  may  be  substituted  for  him,  such  must 
ever  be  the  invariable  result;  perish  at  last 
the  wanderer  must,  in  an  arid  waste  "where 
no  water  is."  That  course  is  dark  and  hope- 
less indeed  in  which  Christ  is  not  the  centre 

*  Gal.  iv.  24. 


24  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

to  which  the  weary  spirit  ever  tends.  There 
is  an  awful  spiritual  solitude  before  it;  and 
there  also  is  that  Mount  Sinai,  with  its  barren 
declivities  and  rocky  turrets,  scarred  by  thun- 
der ;  and  beyond  it  is  the  Red,  red  sea  in  which 
the  weary  never  rest. 

Our  uninstructed  sympathies  ever  take 
part  with  the  oppressed  and  the  unfortunate. 
Sarah's  jealousies  and  cruelties  are  readily 
remembered,  together  with  the  destitution  of 
the  unhappy  exiles ;  but  the  want  of  interest 
on  their  part  in  the  blessings  of  a  spiritual 
and  a  higher  life,  their  promptness  in  for- 
saking without  a  single  regret  the  pure  and 
holy  faith  of  the  church  because  adherence 
to  it  had  become  environed  with  temporary 
obstacles,  is  as  readily  pardoned  and  forgotten, 
though  it  was  their  great  unworthiness,  the 
true  cause  of  their  condemnation  and  ruin. 
God,  on  this  account,  because  he  knew  they 
loved  him  not  and  cared  not  for  the  pro- 
mised spiritual  deliverer,  dictated  the  severity. 
Sarah's  execrations  would  have  proved  all 
impotent  and  unavailing  if  God  himself  had 
not  turned  against  the  aliens.  They  had 
merited  his  displeasure,  since  they  had  in- 
truded themselves  into  his  church,  whose 
most  sacred  things  they  hated  and  had  dared 


ISHMAEL   IN    THE  WILDERNESS.  25 

to  make    the    objects    of    their    unhallowed 
scorn. 

While  the  prophetic  description  —  to  wit, 
that  he  should  be  a  wild  man,  and  that  his  hand 
should  be  against  every  man* — involved  in  it 
no  creative  or  coercive  processes,  it  neverthe- 
less revealed  a  law  inherent  in  his  very  nature 
and  in  that  of  his  race.  During  the  long 
period  of  twenty-seven  hundred  years  his  wild- 
ness  remained  untamed.  Each  one  of  his  off- 
spring, separated  from  all  others  in  his  sym- 
pathies for  himself  alone,  maintained  his  own 
proud  personal  independence  and  marked  out 
for  himself  his  own  solitary  track.  Submission 
to  a  chief,  if  made  at  all,  arose  from  interest, 
and  was  cast  off,  transferred,  or  continued,  at 
pleasure.  In  predatory  bands  in  the  clays  of 
Jeremiah,  they  (the  descendants  of  Ishmael) 
sat  for  the  travellers  in  the  ways  of  the  wTilder- 
ness,f  dreaded  by  all,  lying  concealed  in  the 
shadows  of  mountains,  or  peering  from  behind 
the  clumps  of  trees  that,  bordering  the  water- 
courses, invited  the  wayfarer,  at  burning  noon, 
to  repose.  The  captive  Israelites,  released  from 
servitude  in  Babylon,  crossed  the  track  of  this 
inhospitable  foe  and  made  grateful  mention  of 
the  good  hand  of  God  upon  them,  in  that  he 

*  Gen.  xvi.  12.  t  Jer.  iii.  2. 

3  B 


26       ISHMAEL  AND  THE  CHURCH. 

had  delivered  them  from  "  such  as  lay  in  wait 
by  the  way."*  Impelled  by  hunger  or  by 
lust  of  plunder,  their  marauding  companies, 
mounted  on  the  fleet  horse  of  the  wilderness 
that  stumbled  not,f  made  frequent  incursions 
into  districts  governed  by  neighbouring  emirs. 
The  swift  and  stealthy  advance  was  effected 
under  cover  of  night.  When  the  morning 
rose,  "and  the  oxen"  (of  the  unsuspecting) 
"were  ploughing  and  the  asses  feeding  beside 
them,  the  Sabeans"  (or  Ishmaelites)  "fell  upon 
them  and  took  them  away  ."J  The  assault, 
seen  perchance  by  a  flying  servant  whose  less 
fortunate  companions  were  slain,  is  reported; 
but  redress  is  unth ought  of  and  pursuit  im- 
possible: the  wily  robbers  had  vanished  as 
they  came, — in  unknown  paths  and  in  the 
solitudes  of  the  wilderness.  The  Bedouins  of 
the  present  day  perpetuate  the  original  cha- 
racter— the  wild  and  warlike  habits  of  the 
earliest  times,  and  form  a  continuous  illustra- 
tion of  the  extreme  individuality  and  lawless- 
ness of  the  descendants  of  Ishmael. 

This  character,  also,  is  one  that  equally  de- 
velops itself  in  that  mighty  offshoot  from  the 
parent  stock  which  lias  spread  the  shadow  of 
its  rule  for   ages  over  Arabia  and  over  the 

*  Ezra  viii.  31.  f  Isa.  lxiii.  13.  j  Job.  i.  15. 


ISHMAEL    IN    THE    WILDERNESS.  27 

entire  Southern  hemisphere.  Ishmael,  as  it 
had  been  previously  revealed  in  the  prophecy 
concerning  him,  became  a  great  nation ;  and 
in  this  new  form  of  his  continued  existence 
were  merged  the  idiosyncrasies  of  the  original 
and  isolated  type.  In  other  words,  the  indi- 
vidual, ever  unreliable,  treacherous,  and  ariti- 
christian,  incapable  alike  of  a  permanent 
adherence  to  a  treaty  or  of  a  continued  sub- 
mission to  a  ruler,  when  once  fully  subdued 
and  constituting  with  his  fellows  a  great 
nationality,  made  it  with  respect  to  all  other 
nations  just  what  the  individual  man  had 
previously  been  with  respect  to  all  other  indi- 
viduals. It  became  the  world's  disturbing 
centre,  and  broke  in  alike  for  centuries  upon 
all  its  harmonies. 

The  identity  of  the  same  people  in  succes- 
sive ages  is  more  than  conventional  or  legal; 
it  has  its  seat  in  the  constitution  of  things,  in 
nature  itself,  and  belongs  to  a  nation  in  its 
successive  generations,  just  as  it  belongs  to 
a  man  in  the  successive  periods  of  his  life. 
His  body  is  not  composed  of  the  same  particles 
at  fifty  of  which  it  was  at  twenty ;  his  mind 
has,  likewise,  had  an  infinite  succession  of 
volitions  and  emotions;  and  yet,  though  in  so 
many  respects  a  new  and  a  different  creature, 


28  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

he  still  is  the  same,  and  is  so  held  to  be,  both 
in  law  and  in  fact.  "  Who  ever  perished  be- 
ing innocent?"  Under  the  government  of  a 
righteous  God  punishment  pursues  the  guilty. 
Amalek  was  cut  off  by  Saul  for  murders  com- 
mitted by  a  previous  generation  four  hundred 
years  before.  (1491  B.C.)  Ex.  xvii.  14-16: 
"  The  Lord  said  unto  Moses,  Write  this  for  a 
memorial  in  a  book,  and  rehearse  it  in  the  ears 
of  Joshua :  for  I  will  utterly  put  out  the  re- 
membrance of  Amalek  from  under  heaven. 
And  Moses  built  an  altar,  and  called  the  name 
of  it  Jehovah-nissi :  for  he  said,  Because  the 
Lord  hath  sworn  that  the  Lord  will  have  war 
with  Amalek  from  generation  to  generation." 
(1070  B.C.)  1  Sam.  xv.  2,  3  :  "  Thus  saith  the 
Lord  of  hosts,  I  remember  that  which  Amalek 
did  to  Israel,  how  he  laid  wait  for  him  in 
the  way  when  he  came  up  from  Egypt.  Now 
go  and  smite  Amalek,  and  utterly  destroy  all 
that  they  have."  Verse  9:  "But  Saul  and 
the  people  spared  Agag."  Verses  10,  11 : 
"Then  came  the  word  of  the  Lord  unto 
Samuel,  saying,  It  repenteth  me  that  I  have 
set  up  Saul  to  be  king."  Verses  32,  33 : 
"  Then  said  Samuel,  Bring  ye  hither  to  me 
Agag  the  king  of  the  Amalckites.  And  Agag 
came  unto  him  delicately.     And  Agag  said, 


ISHMAEL    IN    TIIE   WILDERNESS.  29 

Surely  the  bitterness  of  death  is  past.  And 
Samuel  said,  As  thy  sword  hath  made  women 
childless,  so  shall  thy  mother  be  childless 
among  women.  And  Samuel  hewed  Agag  in 
pieces  before  the  Lord  in  Gilgal."  Great  social 
wrongs,  unredressed  and  unregretted,  and  still 
repeated  by  a  seed  of  evil-doers,  demanded  the 
providential  visitation.  The  children  had  risen 
up  "an  increase  of  sinful  men  to  augment  yet 
the  fierce  anger  of  the  Lord."*  Samuel  remind- 
ed Agag  of  this;  and,  while  we  do  not  under- 
stand him  to  deny  his  connection  with  the  guilt 
of  a  former  age,  he  assures  him  that  he  suffers 
for  his  own:— "As  thy  sword  hath  made  wo- 
men childless,  so  shall  thy  mother  be  childless 
among  women."  Such  is  the  unity  and  re- 
sponsibility of  each  distinct  race. 

Destitute  of  all  fraternal  loves  and  local 
attachments,  his  hand  against  every  man,  an 
outlaw  and  a  robber,  Ishmael  entered  on  his 
chosen  domain  and  became  the  lord  and  the 
terror  of  the  wilderness.  On  its  wild  clans, 
and  on  the  twelve  powerful  tribes  and  the 
great  nation  that  sprang  from  him,  he  stamped 
in  indelible  characters  his  own  native  love  of 
war  and  plunder  and  his  ever-living  animosity 
to  the  blessed  Messiah.  

*  Num.  xxxii.  14. 
3* 


CHAPTER  III. 

THE    COMPREHENSIVE   NATIONALITY   OF    ISIIMAEL. 

"The  gatlier'd  guilt  of  elder  times 
Shall  reproduce  itself  in  crimes." 

Gal.  iv.  24,  25  :  "  Which  things  are  an  alle- 
gory: for  these  are  the  two  covenants;  the 
one  from  the  mount  Sinai,  which  gendereth 
to  bondage,  which  is  Agar.  For  this  Agar  is 
Mount  Sinai  in  Arabia,  and  answereth  to  Jeru- 
salem which  now  is,  and  is  in  bondage  with 
her  children."  The  allegory  has  a  wide  range. 
There  is  not  only  more  in  it  than  appears  in 
the  original  narrative,  but  in  this  instance  it 
is  perhaps  unusually  comprehensive,  and  in- 
cludes the  personal  rejection  of  Ishmael  and 
that  of  his  posterity,  as  also  those  other 
descendants  of  the  patriarch  who,  moved  with 
envy,  delivered  their  Lord  to  a  cruel  'death, 
persecuted  those  born  after  the  Spirit,  and  were 
become  "  contrary  to  God  and  contrary  to  all 
men."* 

"  This  Ao;ar  is  Mount  Sinai,  in  Arabia,  and 


*  1  Tbess.  ii.  15. 
30 


COMPREHENSIVE  NATIONALITY  OF  ISHMAEL.     31 

answereth  to  Jerusalem,  wliicli  now  is,  and  is 
in  bondage  with  her  children."  Having  re- 
jected her  Lord,  (thus  Paul  instructs  the 
church  in  the  above-quoted  passage,)  Jerusa- 
lem, amid  her  faded  glories  as  a  doomed  city, 
was  for  this  in  bondage  with  her  misguided 
offspring.  In  a  few  short  years  she  too,  like 
the  son  of  the  bondwoman,  would  become  out- 
cast from  patrimonial  possessions  and  spiri- 
tual privileges,  and  be  houseless,  the  sport  ol 
oppression  and  want,  in  that  wide  wilderness 
in  which  she  should  wander  and  perish  for 
ages.  The  wrath  of  Roman  legions  in  her 
spoliation  and  in  her  wo  would  but  express 
toward  her,  as  did  Sarah's  severities  toward 
Ishmael,  the  punitive  justice  of  offended 
Heaven.  And  when  the  day  should  ulti- 
mately come  for  Isaac's  effectual  calling  and 
spiritual  birth, — when,  raised  from  the  slum- 
ber of  centuries  and  weaned  from  the  love  of 
the  world,  his  return  should  commence,  and 
the  great  feast  should  be  spread  in  his  native 
mountains,  and  he  should  be  about  to  be  so- 
lemnly installed  anew  in  the  blessed  line  of 
the  spiritual  succession, — then  (as  we  under- 
stand the  prophet*)  shall  the  scoffing  and  per- 

*  Isaiah  xxv.  5-8;  Dan.  xi.  44,  45. 


32  ISHMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

secuting  Ishmael  again  and  for  the  last  time 
become  an  outcast  from  the  patriarch's  down- 
trodden heritage.  The  power  of  Sarah's  pro- 
phetic curse  shall  revive  afresh  amid  the  ruins 
of  her  fallen  towers,  the  perils  of  her  returning 
children,  and  prove  mightier  than  the  armies 
of  the  aliens. 

Ishmael  was,  according  to  the  prediction,  to 
"dwell  in  the  presence  of  all  his  brethren."* 
And,  as  the  great  conquerors  of  the  world  have 
ever  failed  to  subdue  Arabia, — as  still,  from  the 
earliest  times  till  now,  the  Arabs  have  watched 
the  traveller  who  has  crossed  their  unprofitable 
sands  and  made  him  pay  tribute, —  as  they 
have  escaped  successively  the  rule  of  the  Per- 
sians, the  Macedonians,  and  the  Romans, — it 
has  been  supposed  that  this  passage  was  in- 
tended as  a  prophetic  description  of  the  future 
independence  of  their  wild  tribes,  from  age 
to  age,  in  their  own  hereditary  dominions. 
"Arabia,  though  its  frontier-provinces  ex- 
perienced some  vicissitudes,  preserved  in  the 
depths  of  its  deserts  its  primitive  character 
and  independence;  nor  had  its  nomadic  tribes 
ever  bent  their  haughty  necks  to  servitude."f 

Gibbon,  in  his  great  eagerness  to  cast  discredit 

*  Gen.  xvi.  12.  -j-  Irving. 


COMPREHENSIVE  NATIONALITY  OF  ISHMAEL.     33 

on  this  prophecy  as  fairly  furnishing  satis- 
factory evidence  in  favour  of  the  inspiration 
of  the  Scriptures,  first  sneers  at  the  idea  and 
then  denies  the  fact  of  the  continued  indepen- 
dence of  the  Ishmaelites ;  but,  before  he  closes 
this  extraordinary  paragraph,  he  indirectly  re- 
tracts and  fully  contradicts  his  first  state- 
ment. "The  perpetual  independence  of  the 
Arabs  has  been  the  theme  of  praise  among 
strangers  and  natives;  and  the  arts  of  con- 
troversy transform  this  singular  event  into  a 
prophecy  and  a  miracle  in  favour  of  the  pos- 
terity of  Ishmael.  Some  exceptions,  that  can 
neither  be  dismissed  nor  eluded,  render  this 
mode  of  reasoning  as  indiscreet  as  it  is  super- 
fluous. The  kingdom  of  Yemen  has  been  suc- 
cessively subdued  by  the  Abyssinians,  the 
Persians,  the  sultans  of  Egypt,  and  the 
Turks;  the  holy  cities  of  Mecca  and  Medina 
have  repeatedly  bowed  under  a  Scythian 
tyrant;  and  the  Roman  province  of  Arabia 
embraced  the  peculiar  wilderness  in  which 
Ishmael  and  his  sons  must  have  pitched  their 
tents  in  the  face  of  their  brethren.  Yet 
these  exceptions  are  temporary  or  local :  the 
body  of  the  nation  has  escaped  the  yoke  of 
the  most  powerful  monarchies.  The  arms  of 
Sesostris  and  Cyrus,  of  Pompey  and  Trajan, 


34  ISHMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

could  never  achieve  the  conquest  of  Arabia. 
The  present  sovereign  of  the  Turks  may  exer- 
cise a  shadow  of  jurisdiction;  but  his  pride 
is  reduced  to  solicit  the  friendship  of  a  people 
whom  it  is  dangerous  to  provoke  and  fruitless 
to  attack."* 

Others  suggest  that  the  text  simply  describes 
the  place  of  their  abode  as  it  related  geogra- 
phically to  the  land  of  Canaan.  It  should  be 
"  to  the  east  of  their  brethren."  The  meaning 
is  confessedly  obscure ;  and,  though  inclined  to 
adopt  as  most  correct  the  view  first  named, 
yet,  were  either  opinion  the  received  one,  it 
would  not  affect  the  obvious  meaning  of  the 
other  portions  of  this  remarkable  prophecy. 
If,  as  we  have  seen,  the  historic  record,  after 
you  exhaust  its  literal  meaning,  is  also  alle- 
gorical, and  comprehends  in  it  even  the  lineal 
descendants  of  Isaac,  who,  in  imitation  of  their 
scoffing  brother,  turn  their  hand  against  every 
man,  then,  though  the  Bedouin  tribes  who  are 
the  present  robber-lords  of  Paran  may  be  the 
lineal  descendants  of  Ishmael,  still,  the  alle- 
gory fairly  comprehends  all  the  tribes  to  whom 
Ishmael  became  related  by  intermarriage  and 
by  mastery,  together  with  any  other  of  the 

*  Gibbon. 


COMPREHENSIVE  NATIONALITY  OF  ISIMAEL.     GO 

descendants  of  Abraham  by  Keturah,  whose 
tribal  life  was  finally  merged  and  lost  in  his 
own. 

It  is  enough,  indeed,  for  our  purpose,  that 
the  characteristics  of  Ishmael — his  love  of  war 
and  booty,  his  irreconcilable  hatred  of  the 
Christian  religion,  and  his  disposition  ever  to 
persecute  its  nominal  or  its  real  disciples — 
have  impressed  themselves  alike  on  all  the  races 
united  by  his  descendants  under  the  sway  of 
the  Koran ;  enough,  that  Mohammed  attracted 
to  his  standard  the  contending  factions  that 
descended  from  his  renowned  progenitor,  and, 
out  of  these  wild  elements,  formed  and  founded 
his  empire;  enough,  that  throughout  Asia, 
Africa,  and  a  part  of  Europe,  other  nations 
were  confessedly  lost  in  it,  as  rivers  and 
streams  are  lost  in  the  sea. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

HIS     EVIL    DESTINY. 

"  The  Maker  justly  claims  the  world  he  made: 
In  this  the  right  of  Providence  is  laid ; 
Its  sacred  majesty  through  all  depends 
On  using  second  means  to  "work  his  ends." 

Parnell. 

What  a  sweet  relief  is  given  to  that  spiritual 
night  which  stretches  its  gloomy  curtains  from 
the  fall  to  the  resurrection-morn,  when,  one 
by  one,  the  living  types  of  the  Messiah,  in  an 
unbroken  succession,  springing  up  amid  whis- 
pers of  comfort  and  angel  footfalls,  span  the 
tlight  of  intervening  ages  with  the  ever-recur- 
ring evidences  of  a  coming  and  a  glorious  dawn ! 
It  is  among  these  that  even  Ishmael,  during 
seventeen  years,  holds  his  elevated  position. 
The  patriarch  regards  him  as  his  heir;  and, 
as  he  was  his  first-born  son,  he  continued  to 
be  the  visible  representative  of  Christ,  in  the 
succession,  until  Isaac,  by  divine  direction, 
took  his  place.  His  rejection,  however,  as  a 
progenitor  of  a  coming  Saviour,  did  not  neces- 


HIS   EYIL   DESTINY.  37 

sarily  remove  him  from  his  saving  interest  in 
a  Redeemer.  By  the  divine  will  he  fell  from 
the  succession;  but  by  his  own  fault  he  fell 
from  the  covenant,  and  sank,  a  baleful  meteor, 
to  the  earth.  Obviously,  however,  he  is  a 
being,  though  never  so  evil,  whose  existence  is 
invested  with  no  ordinary  interest ;  since  that 
wide  world  into  which  he  is  banished  is  to  be 
made  the  theatre  of  his  wonderful  providential 
mission.  God's  kingdom  is  immeasurably  great; 
and,  in  its  administration  by  the  infinite  One, 
no  instructions  are  gathered  from  the  lessons 
of  experience  to  modify  or  change  original 
arrangements.  Indeed,  all  the  innumerable 
details  of  the  comprehensive  rule  are  original 
and  immutable,  lying  back  of  the  genesis  of 
the  heavens  and  the  earth  in  the  fiat  of  the 
uncreated  mind.  In  a  kingdom  so  vast,  and  in 
events  whose  origin  must  remain  hidden  in  the 
bosom  of  remote  ages,  it  is  not  strange  to  see 
things  that  to  human  sagacity  appear  use- 
less or  even  injurious, — blots  on  the  cheek  of 
nature,  imperfections  in  divine  creations,  con- 
necting themselves  only  with  the  chariot  of 
God  as  mire  on  the  pavement  or  dust  from  its 
wheels.  But  the  appearances  are  most  decep- 
tive. The  globe  itself,  curtained  in  night,  flew 
for  unknown  ages  on  its  desolate  track,  with 


38  ISIBIAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

its  elements  slowly  maturing,  that  they  might 
be  ready  at  the  appointed  time  to  be  formed 
into  a  habitation  for  its  living  generations. 
And  in  its  present  state,  with  its  ocean-beds, 
volcanic  fires,  atmospheric  plagues,  and  mighty 
annual  deposits  of  perished  life,  it  is  but  ma- 
turing for  another  change  in  which,  purified  by 
the  flame  that  consumes  it,  it  shall  be  repro- 
duced and  covered  in  every  part  of  it  with 
more  than  its  primeval  bloom  and  beauty.  In 
forming  an  opinion,  then,  of  the  utility  of 
things  in  God's  immense  and  eternal  kingdom, 
we  should  not  forget  the  lessons  of  humility 
which  lie  all  along  our  daring  flight  upward 
toward  that  point,  immeasurably  distant,  which 
separates  the  wisdom  of  God  from  the  ignorance 
of  a  creature.  The  long  preparation  of  Ish- 
mael's  descendants  for  their  mission  of  wo,  and 
the  long  separation  of  Isaac  from  Canaan,  and 
the  long  night  that  settled  for  ages  over  Europe, 
Asia,  Africa,  and  America,  are  but  preparatory 
processes  to  the  introduction  of  a  better  and  a 
brighter  day.  What  though  we  cannot  account 
for  these  mysterious  footprints  in  the  ways  of 
heaven  ?  what  though  the  gulfs  we  attempt  to 
fathom  are  of  an  unknown  depth  and  their 
unsightly  bosoms  covered  with  a  pall  ?  in  the 
fulness  of  time,  the  great   results  will   have 


HIS   EYIL   DESTINY.  39 

been  secured,  and  God  shall  say,  "  Let  there  be 
light."  It  is  a  voluntary  folly  in  any  to  hide 
from  his  eyes  the  agency  of  Heaven  in  all  this 
world's  beauty  or  deformity,  in  all  its  good  or 
evil.  "I  form  the  light  and  create  the  dark- 
ness ;  I  make  peace  and  create  evil ;  I  the 
Lord  do  all  these  things."  Night  and  day, 
volcanoes  and  Edens,  war  and  peace,  demons 
and  angels,  hell  and  heaven,  are  alike  his  crea- 
tions, are  alike  subservient  to  his  ultimate  will. 
Moses  was  born  and  reared  in  the  court  of  the 
Pharaohs,  and,  for  eighty  years,  kept  under 
processes  of  discipline  which  fitted  him  for  his 
future  mission.  The  broken  remnants  of  par- 
tially-subjugated tribes  were  reserved  in  Ca- 
naan to  be  thorns  in  the  sides  and  briers  in 
the  eyes  of  offending  Israel.  And  when  Ish- 
mael  was  banished,  and  wandered  in  the  soli- 
tudes of  Paran,  he  was  for  the  same  reason 
not  left  to  perish.  He  was  a  providential 
instrument,  and  his  was,  though  an  evil,  yet  a 
protected,  life.  In  that  thirsty  desert,  sur- 
rounded by  interminable  and  burning  sands, 
without  shelter  from  the  sun,  and  worn  out 
in  a  long  and  fruitless  search  for  water,  he 
fainted,  and  was  left  under  a  shrub  to  die; 
and,  but  for  a  divine  interposition,  this  had 
been  his  end  and  the  point  at  which  we  might 


40  ISIBTAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

now  have  commenced  to  write  a  totally  differ- 
ent history  of  Asia  and  of  the  world.  Great 
events  were  suspended  on  the  restoration  of  that 
wasting  breath.  Hence  God  said  to  his  mother, 
"Arise,  lift  up  the  lad,  and  hold  him  in  thine 
hand;  for  I  will  make  of  him  a  great  nation. 
And  God  opened  her  eyes,  and  she  saw  a  well 
of  water ;  and  she  went,  and  filled  the  bottle 
with  water,  and  gave  the  lad  drink.  And  God 
was  with  the  lad;  and  he  grew,  and  dwelt  in 
the  wilderness,  and  became  an  archer."  Yes, 
God  was  with  the  lad,  as  he  is  with  the  tiger 
and  his  cubs,  the  earthquake,  the  pestilence, 
and  the  tornado.  He  was  with  him  to  make 
him  a  minister  of  his  }3rovidence, — to  fulfil  its 
decrees  and  to  inflict  its  chastisements  on  the 
guilty. 


CHAPTER  V. 

THE    NATIONALITY    OF    ISHMAEL    OBTAINING 
DEVELOPMENT  IN   MOHAMMED. 

"  Their  breath  is  agitation,  and  their  life 
A  storm  whereon  they  ride."  Byron. 

The  transition  of  the  descendants  of  Ishmael 
from  a  state  of  extreme  personal  independence 
and  of  selfish  isolation  to  that  of  an  organ- 
ized and  a  united  people  was  effected  by  Mo- 
hammed in  the  seventh  century.  The  religious 
creed  of  this  extraordinary  man  was  artfully 
adapted  to  the  native  and  long-cherished  tastes 
of  his  countrymen.  It  turned  their  guilty 
love  of  war  and  spoil  and  their  long-indulged 
animosity  to  the  true  Messiah  into  the  ele- 
ments of  success,  threw  open  the  gates  of 
unbelieving  provinces  and  kingdoms  to  in- 
vasion, and  doomed  them  alike  to  tribute,  the 
Koran,  or  the  sword.  An  army,  irresistible 
from  its  fanatic  courage  if  not  from  its  dis- 
ciplined valour,  sprang  "from  the  dust  of  his 
feet"  and  took  peace  from  the  world.  The 
fierce   contentions   of  twenty-seven   centuries 

4*  C  41 


42  ISHMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

had  been,  up  to  this  period,  either  the  resist- 
ance of  intruders  on  their  appropriated  soil, 
or  the  bloody  strifes  of  individuals,  families, 
and  tribes.  A  spirit  had  reigned  which  had 
hitherto  acknowledged  no  code  of  justice  or 
of  honour,  no  common  tribunal  to  which 
the  weak  could  appeal  for  redress  against 
the  strong, — none,  but  that  which  each  one 
carried  in  the  nice  appreciations  of  his  own 
mind  or  in  the  sure  and  sudden  stroke  of  his 
scimitar.  Falling  back  upon  his  tact  or  cou- 
rage, the  injured  committed  the  arbitrations  or 
the  inflictions  of  the  lex  talionis  to  no  other 
hands  than  his  own.  An  unrelenting  foe,  he 
watched  with  calm  and  unsuspected  vigilance 
the  obnoxious  party,  for  the  opportunity  of 
successful  revenge.  His  victim  fell  in  the  very 
act  of  embracing  a  supposed  friend.  Life's 
warm  current  often  purpled  the  lonely  heath 
with  a  deeper  dye ;  and  the  blood  of  war,  shed 
in  peace,  was  often  put  without  remorse  "  on 
his  girdle  and  in  his  shoes."  The  traditions  of 
the  Arabs  recount  the  occurrence  of  seventeen 
hundred  battles  which  preceded  the  birth  of 
their  prophet.  Up  to  this  period  Ishmael's 
hand  had  ever  been  put  forth,  either  in  self- 
defence,  or  it  had  been  stained  with  fraternal 
blood. 


MOHAMMED.  43 

The  first  outbreak  in  which  his  wild  de- 
scendants became  formidable  and  left  their 
burning  solitudes  to  interrupt  the  peace  of 
nations  was  under  the  discipline  of  Moham- 
med. He  breathed  through  "  their  roving 
bands  the  spirit  of  a  common  fanaticism,  sup- 
pressed their  domestic  feuds,  and  turned  their 
united  strength  against  mankind."  How  won- 
derful  the  prophecy  !  — "  He  will  be  a  wild 
man ;  his  hand  will  be  against  every  man,  and 
every  man's  hand  against  him:"  Gen.  xvi.  12. 
"  Behold,  I  have  blessed  him,  and  will  make 
him  fruitful,  and  will  multiply  him  exceed- 
ingly; twelve  princes  shall  he  beget,  and  I 
will  make  him  a  great  nation :"  Gen.  xvii.  20. 
"And  the  fifth  angel  sounded,  and  I  saw  a 
star  fall  from  heaven  unto  the  earth :  and  to 
him  was  given  the  key  of  the  bottomless  pit :" 
Rev.  ix.  1.  According  to  this  prophecy,  a  great 
national  life  had  been  communicated.  The  facts 
of  history  show  that  it  gained  ultimate  de- 
velopment in  the  Arabian  impostor.  He  pos- 
sessed the  secret  of  power.  "  To  him  was 
given  the  key  of  the  bottomless  pit."  He  was 
born  a.d.  5G9.  And,  though  his  parents  died 
when  he  was  yet  an  infant,  his  uncles  were  rich 
and  noble,  and  the  most  considerable  of  these 
became  his  guardian.     At  the  age  of  twenty- 


44  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

five  he  married  Kadijah,  a  widow  of  rank  and 
fortune,  and  at  once  took  his  station  among 
the  proudest  of  his  countrymen.  His  admirers 
are  fond  of  representing  him  as  having  had 
a  well-knit  and  vigorous  frame ;  as  insinuating 
and  persuasive ;  with  a  world  of  intelligence  in 
the  dark  eye  that  lighted  up  the  ever-varying 
features  of  his  expressive  countenance;  with 
vocal  cadences  of  rare  harmony,  that  swept  the 
secret  chords  of  human  sympathies  and  gave 
character  and  sway  to  his  slightest  utterances ; 
with  a  memory  most  retentive;  with  a  judg- 
ment invested  with  an  intuitive  maturity, — a 
maturity  reached  by  others  only  after  long 
and  careful  study;  as  generous  and  self-pos- 
sessed : — in  a  word,  as  having  had  in  himself 
that  wonderful  concentration  of  all  those  quali- 
ties by  which  he  was  enabled  to  rise  to  power, 
by  which  he  became  the  profound  master  of 
uncultivated  tribes,  on  whose  credulity  he 
knew  how  to  practise,  and  whose  ruinous  in- 
dominancy  he  could  discipline  and  wield. 
This,  I  think,  cannot  be  justly  regarded  as  a 
mere  fancy  sketch.  Providential  instruments 
have  ever  had  impressed  upon  them  the  law 
of  a  most  perfect  adaptation  to  their  ends ;  and 
for  this  reason  this  instrument  was  fitted  to 
become  at  once  the  idol  and  the  oracle  of  the 


MOHAMMED.  45 

desert,  the  terror  and  the  scourge  of  erring 
Christendom.  The  secret  of  his  power  was,  in 
this  and  in  every  other  respect,  the  secret  de- 
cree of  heaven. 

This  will  appear  all  the  more  obvious  when 
you  consider  how  numerous  the  obstacles  that 
barricaded  his  way  to  the  throne  and  re- 
pressed— almost  fatally — his  proud  aspirations 
after  dominion.  In  his  infancy  he  is  an  orphan. 
His  parents  leave  him  without  even  the  means 
of  subsistence.  All  that  falls  to  him  from  pa- 
trimonial estates  is  five  camels  and  a  maid- 
servant. At  the  age  of  forty  he  had,  after 
most  earnest  toil,  made  but  three  converts : 
one  of  these  was  his  wife.  He  proclaimed  the 
unity  of  God, — an  offensive  dogma  among  the 
polytheists  of  Arabia.  They  were  enraged, 
and  sought  his  life.  Among  both  his  execu- 
tioners and  his  judges  it  was  arranged  that  a 
sword  from  each  tribe  should  be  buried  in  his 
heart,  that  their  kindred  tribes  might  mutually 
bear  his  blood  if  his  death  should  rouse  to 
war,  or,  as  superstition  might  have  suggested, 
mutually  share  the  benefit  of  the  expiation  at 
the  altars  of  their  gods. 

At  the  dead  hour  of  night  he  made  his 
escape  from  his  dwelling,  now  narrowly 
watched,  and   unexpectedly  eluded   the  vigi- 


46  ISIIMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

lance  of  the  disappointed  and  remorseless 
Koreishites.  Accompanied  by  a  single  friend, 
he  concealed  himself  for  three  clays  in  a 
cavern  in  Mount  Thor.  The  Koreishites  ex- 
plored every  supposed  hiding-place  in  the  vi- 
cinity of  Mecca, — came  to  the  very  mouth  of 
the  cave  in  which  he  was  lying  concealed. 
Here  a  spider's  web  and  a  pigeon's  nest,*  "  art- 
fully arranged,"  proved  a  successful  deception. 
His  unsuspecting  foes  turned  away.  The  next 
morning  finds  him  springing  from  the  top  of 
the  rock  to  his  camel's  back  and  flying  for 
safety  to  Medina.  The  quick  tramp  of  pur- 
suers at  this  critical  moment  startles  his  ear : 
his  foes  are  indeed  close  upon  him.  On  that 
unbounded  plain,  as  far  as  the  eye  could  reach, 
not  a  hill,  not  a  mound,  not  a  shrub,  offers  a 
hiding-place  to  the  exposed  and  defenceless 
fugitive.  The  nest  of  a  bird,  the  web  of  a 
spider  even,  are  not  now  his  frail  protectors, — 
cannot  now  mislead  and  turn  away  his  armed 
foes.  But,  as  Ishmael  had  escaped  death 
even  when  the  chill  of  its  last  agony  froze  his 
blood,  so  is  Mohammed  also  destined  to  escape, 
_  _ 

*  "During  the  three  days  they  had  lain  hid  here,  a  spider, 
they  tell  us,  had  spun  its  web  over  the  mouth  of  the  cave, 
and  a  pigeon  laid  two  eggs  near  it." — Oclrfcy. 


MOHAMMED.  4  i 

since  his,  too,  is  a  protected  life.  His  secret 
mission  it  was  that  threw  a  spell  upon  his 
captors.  His  fine  figure,  generous  gifts,  fair 
promises,  and  insinuating  address,  abated  their 
resentment.  It  is  said,  also,  that  the  horse  of 
the  fierce  Soraka  fell  at  this  juncture,  and,  re- 
garding it  as  an  evil  omen,  the  savage  returned 
with  his  band.  It  was  as  though  it  had  been 
by  a  divine  intervention  that  he  escaped ;  and 
such,  I  think,  we  are  bound  to  regard  it.  No 
doubt  the  Koreish  troop  were  amazed  even  at 
themselves,  and  at  an  event  which  the  Mo- 
hammedans have  ever  since  deemed  miraculous. 
"In  this  eventful  moment  the  lance  of  an 
Arab  might  have  changed  the  history  of  the 
world."* 

After  sixteen  days  Mohammed  reached  Me- 
dina in  safety.  He  was  mounted  on  a  she- 
camel.  It  was  all  of  this  world  he  had  retained ; 
it  was  all  the  throne  he  had  to  occupy ;  but  he 
assumed,  as  far  as  circumstances  admitted,  the 
ensigns  of  royalty,  and  entered  Medina  with 
an  unfurled  turban  for  his  banner,  suspended 
from  the  point  of  Boreida's  lance,  and  a  palm- 
leaf  canopy  held  over  his  head  by  his  follow- 
ers.    His  train  and  body-guard  amounted  now 

*  Gibbon. 


48  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

to  seventy  men.  In  this  city  his  reverses  ter- 
minated :  his  converts  rallied  around  him, 
Medina  acknowledged  his  mission,  and  in 
seven  years  from  the  Hegira*  he  returned  to 
Mecca  and  entered  it  in  triumph.  He  had  now 
become  both  the  prophet  and  the  prince  of  his 
converted  countrymen, — the  former  and  the 
leader  of  the  first  general  confederacy  among 
the  descendants  of  Ishmael.  Fierce  tribes, 
that  force  could  not  subdue  nor  fear  intimi- 
date, were  under  him,  made  the  victims  of  a 
despotism  to  which  superstition  imparted  an 
absoluteness  and  a  control  more  intimate  and 
effective  than  any  other.  His  body,  until  his 
death,  was  regarded  as  invulnerable  and  im- 
mortal. "When  he  died,  the  reported  event 
was  rejected  as  a  fable ;  and,  while  he  lived, 
every  wish,  every  motion,  was  carefully  ob- 
served and  religiously  venerated.f 

Many  pages  have  been  written  for  the  pur- 
pose of  tracing  and  restricting  his  sudden 
elevation  and  wonderful  successes  to  second 
causes ;  but  to  all  this  it  is  sufficient  to  reply, 
that  second  causes  were  divinely  arranged  and 


*  The  era  of  the  flight  from  Mecca  to  Medina, 
f  "The  hair  of  his  head  that  falls/'  said  an  eye-witness, 
"is  picked  up  by  his  devout  soldiers. " 


MOHAMMED.  49 

made  to  minister  to  the  will  of  heaven,  while 
they,  at  the  same  time,  ministered  to  the  ele- 
vation of  the  impostor.  But  for  this,  he  might 
have  died  in  his  cradle.  But  for  this,  the  web 
of  a  spider  would  not  have  deceived,  nor  his 
eloquent  tongue  or  the  fall  of  a  horse  palsied 
the  arm  of  those  who,  thirsting  for  his  blood, 
had  overtaken  his  flying  steps. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

ISHMAEL   AND   MOHAMMED. CONTINUED. 

"  There  is  a  fire  and  motion  of  the  soul 
Which  will  not  dwell  in  its  own  narrow  heing, 
And,  but  once  kindled,  quenchless  evermore, 
Preys  upon  high  adventure."  Byron. 

The  ninth  chapter  of  the  Apocalypse  is 
generally  admitted  to  relate  to  the  Saracenic 
and  Turkish  empires.  The  correctness  of  this 
view  I  do  not  think  it  necessary  to  defend, 
believing  that  the  few  who  dissent  from  it 
will  be  more  likely  to  be  convinced  by  illustra- 
tions of  the  prophecy,  drawn  from  the  facts  of 
history,  than  by  any  direct  attack  upon  their 
opinions.  An  error  is  often  most  successfully 
refuted  by  a  clear  presentation  of  the  truth. 

"And  the  fifth  angel  sounded;  and  I  saw  a 
star  fall  from  heaven  unto  the  earth :  and  to 
Mm  was  given  the  key  of  the  bottomless  pit. 
And  he  opened  the  bottomless  pit,  and  there 
arose  a  smoke  out  of  the  pit,  as  the  smoke  of  a 
great  furnace :"  Rev.  ix.  1,  2.  With  a  key  the 
door  is  opened,  the  apartment  is  entered.     It 

50 


MOHAMMED.  51 

is  the  emblem  of  power.  He  to  whom  heaven 
gives  it  is  destined  to  have  dominion.  It  will 
fit  the  wards  of  every  lock ;  the  bolts  must 
give  way  before  it.  The  expression  "  To  him 
was  given"  suggests  that  the  agent  designated 
is  a  man ;  and  the  word  "  star"  that  he  was 
an  illustrious  person.  The  passage  points  us 
to  a  distinguished  individual  providentially 
called  to  execute  the  divine  will.  Mohammed 
not  only  descended  from  Ishmael  and  from 
Abraham,  but  he  belonged  to  the  Koreish 
line,*  and  to  that  branch  of  it  regarded  not 
only  as  the  most  considerable  for  its  nobility, 
wealth,  and  power,  but  also  most  remarkable 
as  having  had  committed  to  its  keeping,  for 
many  generations,  the  sacred  temple  of  Mecca. 
Amid  its  mysterious  ceremonials  Mohammed 
had  been  instructed  and  reared,  and  from  his 
youth  had  been  known  throughout  Arabia  as 
its  most  accomplished  and  most  devoted  hiero- 
phant.  The  same  star  that  falls  rises  and 
opens  the  pit.  Loosened  from  its  zone  in  the 
Abrahamic  covenant,  it  descends  to  make  the 
world  the  future  theatre  of  its  baleful  influ- 
ences ;  and,  as  John  the  Baptist  was  but  the 


*  He  descended  from  Hashem,  the  father  of  the  Hashem- 
ites,  and  a  prince  of  great  distinction  in  Arabia  in  his  day. 


52  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

reproduction  of  Elijah,  so  Ishmael  reappears 
also  in  his  successor.  The  restless  energy  of 
the  long-silent  founder  of  the  robber-kingdom 
starts  from  the  ashes  of  his  sepulchre  and 
walks  abroad  again  in  the  hardness  and  daring 
of  his  martial  son.  The  mighty  progenitor 
marked  out  for  himself  his  own  track, — 
stamped  his  own  character  on  more  than  fifty 
generations.  His  renowned  descendant  had 
the  same  gift  of  power,  invented  the  dark 
sentences  of  Hara,  and  founded  an  empire  in 
blood.  By  the  retained  rite  of  circumcision, 
as  well  as  by  the  testimony  of  tradition,  he 
and  his  associate  dwellers  in  the  desert  have 
justly  claimed  to  be  the  lineal  descendants  of 
Ishmael.  If  the  rite  of  circumcision  among 
the  dispersed  Jews  proves  their  descent  from 
Abraham,  then  the  same  rite  in  immemorial 
usage  among  the  large  and  powerful  families 
of  the  Koreishites  should  be  received  as 
equally  satisfactory  evidence  of  their  descent 
from  the  same  original  stock.  Palestine  and 
Arabia  have  alike  the  seal  of  circumcision 
and  are  alike  under  the  rule  of  the  patriarch's 
seed. 

"And  there  arose  a  smoke  out  of  the  pit,  as 
the  smoke  of  a  great  furnace."  Mecca,  the 
sacred  city  of  the  Mohammedans,  is  situated 


MOHAMMED.  53 

in  the  centre  of  a  barren  plain  and  surrounded 
by  naked  and  precipitous  mountains.  Within 
its  walls  is  the  Kaaba,  the  sacred  house  or 
temple  of  the  Arabs,  built,  as  their  traditions 
affirm,  by  Abraham  and  Ishmael,  and  accord- 
ing to  a  heaven-descended  model.  Within  the 
same  enclosure  is  situated  the  memorable  well 
Zem-zem,  said  to  have  been  the  one  pointed 
out  by  the  angel  to  Hagar  when  her  child 
was  dying  with  thirst.  In  the  walls  of  the 
Kaaba  was  placed  the  sacred  stone  that,  tradi- 
tion says,  came  down  from  heaven.  Laying 
aside  for  the  time  their  weapons  and  their 
feuds,  the  idolaters  were  accustomed  to  meet 
here  annually,  and  from  the  earliest  times,  for 
the  worship  of  their  idols.  Seven  times  they 
made  the  circuit  of  the  temple,  and,  having 
kissed  the  black  stone*  in  the  walls,  they 
went  forth  to  resume  their  weapons  and  their 
wars.     This   desolate   spot — the   centre   and 


*  The  black  stone,  which  the  Mohammedans  held  in  great 
reverence  and  believed  to  be  one  of  the  stones  of  Paradise 
which  fell  down  with  Adam  from  heaven,  is  a  small  stone 
set  in  silver  and  fixed  in  the  southeast  corner  of  the  Kaaba, 
about  four  feet  from  the  ground.  It  is  said  to  be  white 
within,  but  to  have  turned  black  on  the  outside  by  the 
sins  of  the  people,  or,  more  probably,  by  the  kisses  of  the 
pilgrims. " — Ocklcy's  Saracens,  Part  III. 
5* 


54  ISIIMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

support  of  a  dark  superstition — was  the  place 
of  Mohammed's  nativity ;  and  the  gloomy  pit 
on  the  slopes  of  Mount  Hara,  hard  by,  the 
crater  whence  issued  his  desolating  creed. 
The  character  of  this  creed,  its  unscrupulous 
perversions  of  truth,  the  opposition  to  the 
Messiah  which  it  inculcates,  and  the  unclean- 
ness  and  cruelty  to  which  it  incites,  are  alike 
in  keeping  with  the  known  sympathies  of  the 
father  of  lies,  are  alike  suggestive  of  pande- 
monial  influences.  The  surrounding  desert  is 
likewise  a  vast  solitude,  without  either  water 
or  verdure,  and  covered  with  loose  sands. 
To  these  the  tornado  sometimes  imparts  the 
motions  of  a  troubled  sea,  in  whose  burning 
bosom  caravans  and  armies  perish.  The 
winds — especially  those  that  prevail  from  the 
southeast — are  usually  burdened  with  heat, 
and  are  often  destructive  of  animal  life.  "At 
eleven  o'clock,"  says  Bruce,  "while  we  con- 
templated with  great  pleasure  the  rugged  top 
of  Chiggre,  to  which  we  were  fast  approaching, 
and  where  we  were  to  solace  ourselves  with 
plenty  of  good  water,  Idris,  our  guide,  cried 
out,  with  a  loud  voice,  '  Fall  upon  your  faces, 
for  here  is  the  Simoom !'  I  saw  from  the  south- 
east a  haze  come,  in  colour  like  the  purple 
part  of  the  rainbow,  but  not  so  compressed  or 


MOHAMMED.  55 

thick.  It  did  not  occupy  twenty  yards  in 
breadth,  and  was  about  twelve  feet  high  from 
the  ground.  It  was  a  kind  of  blush  upon  the 
air,  and  moved  very  rapidly,  for  I  scarce  could 
turn  to  fall  upon  the  ground  with  my  head  to 
the  northward,  when  I  felt  the  heat  of  its 
current  plainly  upon  my  face.  We  all  lay  flat 
on  the  ground,  as  if  dead,  till  Idris  told  us  it 
was  blown  over.  The  meteor  or  purple  haze 
which  I  saw  was  indeed  passed,  but  the  light 
air  which  still  blew  was  of  a  heat  to  threaten 
suffocation.  For  my  part,  I  found  distinctly  in 
my  breast  that  I  had  imbibed  a  part  of  it; 
nor  was  I  free  of  an  asthmatic  sensation  till  I 
had  been  some  months  in  Italy,  at  the  baths 
of  Poretta,  near  two  years  afterwards." 

These  hot  blasts  might  well  be  regarded  as 
the  fiery  gusts  that  rush  up  from  the  prison- 
house  of  the  lost.  The  hills  rise  abruptly 
from  the  cheerless  plain.  No  forests  protect, 
with  their  grateful  shade,  from  the  blaze  of 
noon;  no  rivers  cross  the  weary  track;  they 
are  absorbed  in  sandy  basins  of  unknown 
depths;  and,  when  an  oasis  is  reached,  the 
springs  that  rise  to  the  surface  are  brackish 
and  offensive,  from  the  saline  or  bituminous 
deposits  through  which  they  have  made  their 
secret  way.     It  is  a  region  in  contrast  with 


56  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

every  other  inhabited  by  man.  If,  amid  the 
flowers  and  fruits,  the  verdure,  salubrity,  and 
melody,  the  gorgeousness  of  the  skies  and  of 
the  plumage  of  unknown  birds,  in  the  New 
World,  the  early  navigators  believed  them- 
selves in  the  immediate  vicinity  of  the  garden 
of  Eden,  and  made  its  precise  situation  the 
object  of  persevering  search,  then  might  the 
Evangelist,  in  his  vision  of  the  Kaaba,  as  it 
presented  itself  to  him,  surrounded  by  no  signs 
of  vegetable  life,  standing  on  deep  beds  of 
sulphur  and  of  salt,  overshadowed  by  desolate 
mountains,  in  one  of  which  opened  the  gloomy 
cell  of  the  great  deceiver  of  the  southern 
hemisphere,  describe  it  as  the  hold  of  foul 
spirits,  the  open  crater  of  the  bottomless  pit. 

There  are  also  traceable  resemblances  be- 
tween fallen  spirits  and  the  gaunt  and  wily  ban- 
ditti that  lie  in  wait  amid  the  dusky  haunts  of 
the  desert.  Their  fierce  black  eyes,  elfish  locks, 
high  cheek-bones,  and  dragon-teeth,  warn  you 
at  their  approach  of  the  neighbourhood  of  evil. 
Such  faces  never  mask  a  heart  of  love.  They 
are  the  outward  signs  of  the  long-indulged 
impulses  of  cruelty  and  selfishness.  They  are 
the  designations  of  a  race  whom  heaven  re- 
strains not.  Their  home  has  ever  been  one 
of  unatoned  wrong.     From  it  pity  fled  when 


MOHAMMED.  57 

the  scoffer  set  his  foot  in  it;  since  when  its 
retaliations,  enraged  into  fiercer  reprisals  at 
every  turn,  have  arrested  in  rivers  of  kindred 
blood  an  increase  which,  but  for  this,  would 
of  itself,  in  its  own  native  outworkings,  have 
proved  fatal  to  Eastern  civilization. 

Thus,  in  a  thirsty  and  boundless  waste, 
swept  by  fiery  winds,  traversed  by  sharp  and 
naked  mountains,  the  hold  of  superstition, 
deceit,  and  murder,  the  patrimony  of  outcast 
generations,  John  saw  a  master-spirit  rise, 
open  its  pandemonial  gates,  and  let  loose  its 
hitherto  pent-up  furies  upon  erring  Christen- 
dom. 


CHAPTER  VII. 

THE    SECRET   OF   MOHAMMED'S  SUCCESS. 

"  To  him  was  given  the  key  of  the  bottomless  pit." — St.  John. 
"  The  sword  is  the  key  of  heaven  and  of  hell." — Mohajlmed. 

A  great  idea,  clearly  brought  out  by  a 
master-mind,  possesses  often  a  volcanic  power. 
Of  this  kind  was  that  which  Moses  presented 
in  the  court  of  the  Pharaohs.  It  asserted  the 
supremacy  of  God  over  all  kings,  kingdoms, 
and  laws,  and  demanded,  on  that  single  ground, 
the  immediate  and  unconditional  liberation  of 
his  people.  "Thus  saith  the  Lord  God  of 
Israel :  Let  my  people  go."  Thus  was  asserted 
God's  unbounded  and  righteous  dominion.  It 
was  a  lost  truth.  Its  reproduction  convulsed 
the  world :  proud  kings  were  awed,  and  idola- 
trous kingdoms  toppled  and  fell  before  it.  In 
that  great  idea  God  "beheld  and  drove  asunder 
the  nations.  He  uttered  his  voice;  the  earth 
melted." 

A  great  idea  gained  distinct  utterance  in  the 
commencement  of  the  Christian  era.     It  an- 

58 


THE   SECRET   OF   MOHAMMED'S   SUCCESS.        59 

nounced  the  righteousness  of  faith, —  a  lost 
though  a  vital  truth.  It  agitated  the  com- 
monwealth of  Rome  to  its  political  and  moral 
centres  as  though  it  had  been  the  voice  of 
God,  and  changed  the  religions  and  habits  of 
all  its  provinces.  The  reproduction  of  the 
same  idea  in  the  sixteenth  century  produced 
the  greatest  and  the  most  desirable  revolution 
of  modern  times. 

When  Mohammed  gave  himself  up  to  the 
devices  or  the  rhapsodies  of  Hara,  his  country- 
men were  the  worshippers  of  the  luminaries  of 
heaven,  and  of  numerous  other  deities.  Three 
hundred  and  sixty  idols,  of  every  conceivable 
variety  of  form  and  ritual  known  to  the  Ori- 
entals, rilled  the  niches  and  adorned  the  pedes- 
tals of  the  temple  of  Mecca.  And  throughout 
all  the  world,  in  the  East  and  in  the  West, 
wherever  the  visible  church  had  spread  her 
faith,  with  limited  exceptions,  there  had  sprung 
up  a  disguised  paganism.  Retaining  the  names 
of  things  divine,  the  church  had  changed  their 
meaning.  Her  images,  the  objects  of  her  ado- 
ration, were  not  called  idols,  but  saints;  not 
named  Jupiter  and  Minerva,  but  Peter  and 
Mary,  and  after  the  canonized  worthies  of  her 
communion.  True  religion  had  fled  to  the 
mountains.    Idolatry  had  been  restored.    That 


60  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

we  may  understand  the  providential  Reasons 
for  the  elevation  of  the  hierophant  of  the  Kaaba 
and  of  the  cavern,  at  this  juncture,  to  his 
throne,  we  should  not  forget  or  overlook  the 
concomitant  universal  prevalence  of  idolatry, 
nor  the  coincident  revelation  of  the  man  of 
sin,  who  had  just  then  become  unmasked  by 
being  proclaimed  universal  bishop,  and  had 
commenced  openly  to  exercise  his  spiritual 
lordship  by  enforcing  the  worship  of  pieces  of 
wood,  wafer  gods,  and  dead  men's  bones,  pro- 
voking by  his  idolatries  and  oppressions  the 
retributions  of  Heaven. 

The  creed  of  the  wily  Arab  was  not  the 
offspring  of  chance,  but  one  in  the  formation 
of  which  his  sagacity  had  been  providentially 
instructed,  and  which  was  destined,  in  work- 
ing out  its  own  hidden  life,  to  develop  and 
fulfil  the  mission  to  which  he  and  his  race 
had  been  so  wonderfully  reserved.  That  creed 
contained  a  grand  and  an  eternal  truth, —  a 
truth  simple,  sublime,  and  in  harmony  with 
the  teachings  of  Abraham,  Moses,  and  Messias, 
and  yet  a  truth  that  put  him  in  debate  with 
the  world.  "  There  is  no  God  but  one !"  was 
the  short  but  sententious  utterance  that  shook 
on  their  polluted  thrones  the  idols  of  Arabia 
and  of  Christendom ;    that   originated  in  the 


THE   SECRET  OF   MOHAMMED'S   SUCCESS.        61 

desert  that  fierce  civil  war  which  ended  in 
the  triumph  of  Mohammed,  and  in  the  union 
of  its  segregated  tribes  under  the  government 
of  a  single  chief.  Persuasion  and  miracles,  he 
maintained,  had  been  the  abortive  alternatives 
in  the  gentler  mission  of  Jesus;  but  more 
effective  measures  were  now  demanded,  and 
Heaven  had  committed  to  his  hand  the  sword. 
With  it  he  was  required  to  chastise  and  reform 
the  worlds  idolatrous  kingdoms. 

Truth  is  often  essential  to  success, — even 
when  error  mars  and  defaces  it.  The  great  truth 
that  headed  the  creed  of  Mohammed  turned  a 
daring  fiction  into  a  probable  verity.  Both 
were  necessary  to  create  an  army  of  fanatics 
and  to  found  the  Saracenic  empire.  He  began 
his  mission,  like  Moses,  with  the  professed  sen- 
tences of  inspiration :  but  no  signs  attended 
him ;  no  sea  opened  at  the  exodus  of  a  nation ; 
no  mountain,  wrapped  in  fire  and  darkness,  be- 
came for  a  whole  year  his  mighty  oracle.  His 
fables  about  Gabriel's  midnight  visits  to  his 
cavern,  bringing  with  him  the  chapters  of  the 
Koran,  and  of  his  ride  on  his  mysterious  Borak 
from  Mecca  to  Jerusalem,  and  thence  through 
the  seven  heavens,  where  he  passed  the  veil 
of  unity,  approached  within  two  bowshots  of 
the  throne,  and  felt  a  cold  that  pierced  his 


62  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

heart  as  his  shoulder  was  touched  by  the  hand 
of  God,  were  esteemed  fables,  and  awakened 
for  him  the  scorn  and  persecution  of  his  coun- 
trymen. Ten  years  he  toiled  at  Mecca.  His 
inventions  and  his  eloquence  won  him  few 
converts ;  yea,  rather  alienated  his  friends  and 
exasperated  his  foes.  At  length,  abandoned 
by  all,  he  mounted  his  camel  and  fled  for  his 
life.  His  mission  thus  far  had  proved  a  total 
failure,  and  he  must  have  perished  in  oblivion 
but  for  the  addenda  to  his  creed, — an  after- 
thought to  which  he  is  now  at  length  driven 
by  defeat  and  despair. 

He  was  now  become  sufficiently  enlightened 
as  to  the  hopelessness  of  his  cause  if  he  did 
not  at  once  resort  to  the  alternative  of  force. 
Moses  and  our  blessed  Lord  gave  credibility 
to  their  missions  by  their  miracles;  but  Mo- 
hammed was  but  a  pretender,  and  could  suc- 
ceed in  but  one  way.  When  this  idea  had 
at  length  struggled  into  distinct  being  in  the 
mind  of  the  forlorn  deceiver,  he  recovered 
at  once  his  fallen  courage.  One  can  hardly 
fail  to  see  his  eye  kindle  and  his  bosom  swell 
as  the  accents  fall  from  his  lips : — "  The  sword 
is  the  key  of  heaven  and  of  hell."  As  he 
grasps  its  hilt,  it  becomes  in  his  vision  instinc- 
tive with  his  destiny.     "A  drop  of  blood  shed 


THE   SECRET  OF   MOHAMMED'S   SUCCESS.        63 

in  the  cause  of  God,  a  night  spent  in  arms,  is 
of  more  avail  than  two  months  of  fasting  and 
prayer."  The  gulf  that  had  opened  its  smould- 
ering chasm  at  his  feet  is  thus  passed  at  a 
single  bound.  "Mohammed  had  now  a  dream 
that  he  held  in  his  hand  the  key  of  the  Kaaba, 
and  that  he  and  his  men  made  the  circuit 
round  it  and  performed  all  the  ceremonies  of 
the  pilgrimage.  Having  told  his  dream  next 
morning,  he  and  his  followers  were  all  in  high 
spirits  upon  it,  taking  it  for  an  omen  that 
they  should  shortly  be  masters  of  Mecca."* 

In  commemoration  of  this  dream  of  the  key, 
the  Andalusian  Moors  suspended  one  on  the 
arch  of  their  Alhambra,  and  bore  the  sign  of 
one  painted  on  their  standards.  He  had  now 
found  out  the  secret  of  power.  He  grasped  the 
key;  the  bolt  yielded  to  its  magic  touch;  the 
obstruction  gave  way  amid  the  successive 
shocks  of  a  great  social  revolution.  He  drew 
his  sword  to  enforce  his  creed.  The  idolaters 
resisted.  Three  hundred  and  thirteen  armed 
fanatics  were  all  that  supported  his  infant  em- 
pire. Undismayed  by  superior  numbers,  though 
in  peril  of  his  life,  his  companions  overpowered 
and   falling   around   him,  he   is   nevertheless 

*Ockley,  p.  46  :  5th  Loudon  edition,  (Bohn;)  1848. 


64  ISHMAEL   AND    THE  CHURCH. 

equal  to  the  terrible  exigency.  Springing  to 
the  back  of  his  white  mule,  he  rallies  his  fol- 
lowers, rushes  upon  his  foes,  and,  in  imitation 
of  the  ancient  prophets,  casts  dust  in  their 
faces.  Superstition  now  comes  to  his  aid :  it 
oppresses  his  enemies.  They  fly  in  their  turn ; 
and,  in  the  very  moment  of  defeat,  the  impostor 
is  suddenly  victorious,  and  that  almost  without 
striking  another  blow.  Amia,  a  surviving 
idolater,  when  pointed  to  the  pit  at  Beder  in 
which  Mohammed  had  cast  the  bodies  of  his 
fallen  foes,  uttered  the  death-wail  of  Arabian 
paganism.  The  courage  of  the  lonely  chief 
spent  itself  in  pathetic  lamentation  rather  than 
in  an  appeal  to  the  sword : — 

"  Alas  !  the  peers  and  princes  of  the  people, — 
How  fallen  at  Beder  and  at  Kandali ! 
All  night  exposed  lie  there  both  old  and  young, 
Naked  and  breathless. 

Oh,  what  a  change  has  come  to  Mecca's  vale ! 
Even  sandy  desert  plains  are  drown' d  in  tears."* 

But  larger  armies  rally;  marches  and 
countermarches,  battles  and  sieges,  follow 
each  other  in  quick  succession.  The  alarm  of 
war  falls  back  deep  into  the  interior;  dusky 
warriors  rush  up  from  their  wild  retreats ;  ten 

Ockley,  p.  35. 


THE   SECRET   OF   MOIIAMMED'S   SUCCESS.        65 

thousand  watch-fires  glimmer  at  the  siege  of 
Mecca.  The  idolaters  are  everywhere  routed. 
The  lieutenants  of  Mohammed  spread  his  sway 
from  the  Gulf  of  Persia  to  the  Red  Sea.  The 
idols  are  destroyed,  the  altars  of  superstition 
demolished ;  and,  amid  the  crash  of  arms  and  the 
cloud  of  battle  that  settled  dark  over  the 
bosom  of  the  desert,  the  false  prophet  esta- 
blished his  creed  and  stood  at  the  head  of  an 
army  of  devotees,  the  conqueror  of  Arabia,  the 
founder  of  a  new  kingdom,  the  author  and 
propagator  of  a  new  faith. 

Surrounding  nations  did  not  understand  the 
nature  of  that  fierce  domestic  war  that  shook 
the  depth  of  the  wilderness  with  the  tramp  of 
camels  and  horses,  and  that  skirted  the  horizon 
with  its  long  lines  of  tents  and  camp-fires.  All 
was  indistinct;  Mohammed,  his  creed,  his  as- 
sault upon  the  religion  of  his  native  land,  all 
were  invisible  to  the  distant  beholder  at  the 
time.  The  signs  of  tumult  and  of  war,  the  pro- 
gress of  a  great  and  destructive  conflict  sweep- 
ing over  the  entire  peninsula, — this  was  visible, 
but  visible  only  as  it  stood  alone,  without  ex- 
planation of  its  causes  and  aims, — visible,  "as 
the  smoke  of  a  great  furnace"  rising  from  the 
bosom  of  the  desert. 

6* 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

ISLAMISM  A  PERVERSION   OF  CHRISTIANITY. 

"A  king,  ....  understanding  dark  sentences,  shall  stand  up." 
Dan.  viii.  23 

Throughout  the  Koran,  in  maintaining  the 
unity  of  God,  Mohammed  in  almost  every 
chapter  assails  the  divinity  of  Christ.  While 
he  insists,  in  his  opposition  to  the  Jews,  that 
Jesus  was  not  an  impostor,  and  holds  them  to 
a  terrible  account  for  what  he  declares  to  have 
been  an  abortive  attempt  to  put  him  to  death, 
he  also  insists,  with  a  still  greater  earnestness 
and  frequency,  that  he  was  a  mere  man,  though 
a  prophet,  and  that  to  maintain  that  he  was 
the  Son,  companion,  or  equal  of  God,  deserved 
not  only  death  but  the  everlasting  torments  of 
hell.  He  makes  himself  our  Lord's  equal,  if 
not  his  superior,  and  turns  his  promise  of  an- 
other comforter  into  a  prediction  that  relates 
to  himself.  He  sets  aside  necessarily  the  ex- 
piatory nature  of  the  crucifixion,  inasmuch  as 
he  denies  the  fact ;  asserting  that  our  Lord  was 

66 


ISLAMISM  A  PERVERSION   OF    CHRISTIANITY.       67 

not  crucified  at  all,  the  Jews  having  mistaken 
another  for  him.  While,  in  the  apprehensions 
of  his  unenlightened  mind,  the  divine  unity 
seemed  ever  in  conflict  with  his  deity  and  lord- 
ship, his  actual  crucifixion  detracted  also  largely 
from  his  glory  as  a  prophet.  Nor  does  it  ap- 
pear ever  to  have  occurred  to  him  that  the 
deity  of  Christ  could  possibly  be  held  by  any 
one  who  did  not  of  necessity  at  the  same  time 
repudiate  the  favourite  dogma  of  his  creed.  He 
therefore  doomed  all  who  held  it  to  the  sword 
and  to  the  flames.  His  grand  idea  not  only 
threw  up  a  black  cloud  upon  the  face  of  the 
sun;  it  also  obscured  the  whole  atmosphere  of 
truth.  He  maintained  that  the  Koran  came 
from  heaven  and  was  sent  down  for  the  con- 
firmation of  the  Scriptures  and  for  their  true 
and  ultimate  interpretation. 

The  sun  and  the  air  are  in  this  prophecy 
representative  terms.  Their  obscuration  pro- 
ceeds from  the  well-known  source  of  oppo- 
sition to  things  heavenly  and  divine.  Christ 
is  the  Sun  of  righteousness  and  the  glory  of 
revealed  religion.  The  Holy  Scriptures,  which 
contain  and  exhibit  him,  are  the  atmosphere 
illuminated  by  him.  And,  as  the  "  dark  sen- 
tences" of  Hara  confused  and  perverted  their 
testimony,  they  were   represented  as  the  in- 


68  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CIIURCH. 

ventions  of  infernal  malevolence,  the  smoke 
of  the  bottomless  pit.  The  Koran  is  a  re- 
production of  many  of  the  facts  contained  in 
Moses  and  in  the  Evangelists,  but  so  modified 
as  to  suit  the  sinister  purposes  of  the  im- 
postor. Everywhere  the  unity  of  God  is  as- 
serted and  idolatry  condemned.  Even  Jesus 
is 'made  to  deny  that  he  ever  taught  his 
own  divinity  or  ever  authorized  the  divine 
honours  paid  to  him.  And  Noah,  Abraham, 
Moses,  and  David,  are  all  brought  up  as  wit- 
nesses, and  each  one  in  his  turn  is  made  to 
testify  to  the  divine  unity  and  to  endorse  the 
mission  of  the  prophet  of  Mecca.  As  he  had 
no  miracles  to  fall  back  upon,  he  thus  fell  back 
upon  the  authority  of  those  who  had,  and,  in 
this  manner,  with  a  consummate  artfulness, 
turned  the  sacred  books  of  both  Jews  and 
Christians  into  witnesses  to  the  truth  of  his 
own  dogma. 

It  is  thus  that  the  sun  and  the  air  are 
darkened  by  reason  of  the  smoke  of  the  pit. 
A  room  is  darkened  when  you  put  out  the 
candle;  a  city,  when  you  turn  off  its  light;  but 
if  a  black  pall  be  hung  on  the  face  of  the  sun 
the  whole  world  is  darkened.  Though  the  ex- 
istence and  the  unity  of  God  are  assumed  and 
taught  in  the  Scriptures,  as  they  are  also  in  the 


ISLAMISM  A  PERVERSION   OF   CHRISTIANITY.      G9 

whole  universe  of  material  things,  yet  the  grand 
idea  that  ever  occurs  and  that  ever  lights  up 
and  adorns  the  sacred  page  is  that  of  atone- 
ment. When  sin  had  entered  the  world  and 
Eden  and  hope  were  lost,  embodied  in  the  first 
promise,  it  whispered  comfort  to  the  race  and 
broke  the  silence  of  despair.  And  from  this 
blessed  hour  it  began  to  unfold  and  expand 
and  impress  itself  on  human  convictions. 

It  glimmered  in  sacrificial  fires,  for  ages,  over 
whole  countries  and  from  a  thousand  altars. 
From  the  exodus  to  the  crucifixion,  it  shed 
upon  Mount  Zion  the  never-ceasing  sacrifice 
of  blood.  It  reflected  its  significance  and  its 
remedial  glory  from  all  the  incidents  of  the  in- 
spired history, — in  Noah's  ark,  the  offering  of 
Isaac,  the  brazen  serpent,  the  falling  manna, 
the  smitten  rock.  The  high-priest,  the  gar- 
ments that  he  wore,  and  the  ritual  that  regu- 
lated and  directed  his  mediations,  were  its 
"image  and  superscription."  The  tabernacle, 
the  temple,  the  lamb,  the  scape-goat,  the  altar, 
the  mercy-seat,  all,  all  were  shadows  of  Him 
who  by  one  offering  should  forever  perfect  all 
them  that  are  sanctified.  He  was  the  grand 
basis  of  the  everlasting  covenant;  and  when 
those  holy  bards,  inspired  to  sing  of  things 
divine,  rose  to  the  loftiest  range  of  thought  and 


70  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

melody,  it  was  "when  they  saw  his  glory  and 
spake  of  him."  "To  him  gave  all  the  pro- 
phets witness."  His  death  and  resurrection, 
his  love,  his  conquests,  his  mediatorial  reign 
and  work,  permeate  the  pages  of  the  Old  Testa- 
ment. In  the  New,  the  four  Evangelists  fur- 
nish us  with  his  biography;  the  Acts  of  the 
Apostles,  with  the  testimony  of  the  Spirit  to 
his  mission  of  mercy.  The  Epistles  contain  a 
formal  statement  and  defence  of  the  expiatory 
nature  of  his  sacrifice  and  intercession,  and,  from 
first  to  last,  the  sum  of  the  inspired  utterance 
is  that  of  atonement  made,  a  ransom  found,  a 
remedy  provided,  a  Messiah  offered  up,  a  high- 
priest  passed  into  the  heavens, — Jesus,  the  Son 
of  God,  able  to  save  to  the  uttermost,  seeing  he 
ever  liveth  to  make  intercession. 

Take  this  away,  and,  while  the  idea  of  the 
divine  unity  would  still  stand  impressed  on 
the  sacred  page  as  it  does  on  the  face  of  na- 
ture, yet  there  would  be  there  no  recorded 
hope  for  lost  man;  its  lustre  would  be  tar- 
nished, its  harmony  and  its  benediction  lost. 
While  it  preached  to  me  most  incoherently 
of  unity  and  purity,  it  would  present  to  my 
wistful  search  no  Kedeemer,  and  leave  me  in 
despair.  It  is  thus  that  the  glory  of  our  Lord 
is  obscured  by  the  effusions  of  Hara.     He  is 


ISLAMISM  A  PERVERSION   OF   CHRISTIANITY.      71 

not  indeed  denied  a  place  in  the  prophetic 
galaxy,  but  he  is  denied  to  have  been  the  Son 
of  God  in  his  incarnation,  and  an  expiatory 
sacrifice  in  his  crucifixion.  The  Scriptures  are 
in  like  manner  not  denied,  but  professedly  con- 
firmed, by  the  Koran,  while  throughout  their 
entire  and  illustrious  testimony  hell  spreads 
out  her  torn  cloud,  intercepting  the  rays  of  the 
Sun  of  righteousness  and  hanging  an  atmo- 
sphere heavy  and  dark  between  earth  and 
heaven.  Ah  me!  thou  blessed  apostle  of 
Jesus !  that  were  indeed  the  smoke  of  a  pan- 
demon  furnace  that  could  thus  throw  a  shadow 
on  the  glory  of  our  Lord  and  obscure  the  efful- 
gence of  his  word. 


CHAPTER  IX. 

THE   SARACENS — THEIR  FANATIC    COURAGE. 


"And  there  came  out  of  the  smoke  locusts  upon  the  earth." — 
Rev.  ix.  3. 


An  obvious  truth  —  a  truth  lying  at  the 
foundation  of  all  enlightened  conviction  and 
worship — formed  the  basis  for  the  errors  of 
the  superstructure  in  the  religion  of  the  false 
prophet.  All  attempts  to  refute  the  dogma — 
a  dogma  made  prominent  in  every  ground  of 
invasion  or  treaty  of  peace,  in  every  orison  or 
battle-cry — were  ever  a  failure.  It  challenged 
the  assent  of  Jew  and  Gentile  as  to  an  in- 
tuitive truth  that  carried  with  it  its  own  evi- 
dence, and  that  imposed  on  all  the  obligations 
of  an  unhesitating  faith.  Joshua  had  waved 
the  sword  of  doom  over  Canaan  for  denying 
it;  and  Arabia,  it  was  now  affirmed,  was  called 
upon,  by  the  last  and  the  most  illustrious  of 
heaven's  prophetic  missionaries,  to  maintain  in 
the  earth  "  the  worship  of  one  sole  and  mighty 
God."    The  truth  contained  in  the  creed  made 

72 


THE  SARACENS — THEIR  FANATIC   COURAGE.     73 

the  error  respectable;  the  error  made  war  a 
duty;  and  the  rewards  of  booty  and  of  para- 
dise made  the  unitarian  army  destructive  and 
terrible,  if  not  invincible. 

"And  there  came  out  of  the  smoke  locusts 
upon  the  earth." 

"  I  swear,"  said  the  impostor,  "  by  the  moun- 
tain upon  which  God  spake  to  Moses,  by  what 
is  contained  in  the  book  written  in  parchment, 
by  the  first  temple  of  Mecca,  by  the  arches  of 
the  heavens,  and  by  the  sea  full  of  water, 
that  God  is  one  sole  God,  and  the  punishment 

promised    to    unbelievers   is   infallible 

They    shall    be    precipitated   in   the   fire    of 

hell Who  are  the  more  happy? — they 

who  are  in  our  felicity,  or  such  as  are  near  to 
Zacon,  the  tree  of  hell?  This  tree  cometh 
out  of  the  bottom  of  hell ;  it  riseth  high,  and 
the  branches  themselves  resemble  the  heads  of 
devils.    The  damned  shall  eat  the  fruit  thereof. 

They  shall   drink   boiling  water The 

fruit  of  the  tree  of  hell,  called  Zacon,  shall 
serve  for  fruit  to  the  wicked.  It  shall  boil  in 
their  bellies  like  pitch  or  water.  They  shall 
cry,  'Take  the  wicked;  drag  them  into  the 
fire  of  hell !  pour  upon  their  heads  all  manner 
of  torments!'  It  shall  be  said  to  them, 
'  Taste  the  pains  of  hell  I'  .  .  .  .  The  righteous 


74  ISHMAEL   AND    THE   CHURCH. 

shall  be  in  delicious  places,  in  gardens  adorned 
with  fountains.  They  shall  be  clothed  with 
purple.  They  shall  behold  each  other  face  to 
face.  We  will  assemble  them  with  women 
pure  and  clean,  who  shall  have  most  beautiful 
eyes.  They  shall  have  fruits  savoury  and  de- 
licious, of  all  seasons.  They  shall  never  die. 
....  They  shall  be  clothed  with  silk,  repose 
on  stately  beds,  and  shall  not  be  troubled 
either  with  the  heat  of  the  sun  or  the  cold  of 
the 'moon.  They  shall  be  under  the  shadow 
of  the  trees  of  paradise.  There  shall  they 
gather    fruits     as     they    stand,    sit,    or    lie 

down Whoever    falls    in    battle,    his 

sins  are  forgiven  him:  at  the  day  of  judg- 
ment his  wounds  shall  be  odoriferous  as  musk, 
and  the  loss  of  his  limbs  shall  be  supplied 
by  the  wings  of  the  cherubim."  Such  mo- 
tives engendered  in  the  warm  climate  and  in 
the  warm  constitutions  of  the  Arabs  a  fana- 
tic and  a  voluptuous  zeal,  that  sent  them  in 
swarms  from  their  barren  and  burning  sands 
to  ravage  and  lay  waste  the  fair  provinces  of 
Christendom. 

When  Syria  had  fallen,  and  Africa  had 
been  spoiled,  and  the  Atlantic  coast  had  been 
reached,  it  is  said  that  "Akbah  spurred  his 
horse  into  the  waves,  and,  raising  his  eyes  to 


THE  SARACENS THEIR  FANATIC  COURAGE.  75 

heaven,  exclaimed,  c Great  God!  if  my  course 
were  not  stopped  by  this  sea,  I  would  still  go 
on  to  the  unknown  kingdoms  of  the  West, 
preaching  the  unity  of  thy  holy  name,  and 
putting  to  the  sword  the  rebellious  nations 
who  worship  any  other  gods  but  thee !'  ".* 

The  emotion  of  Akbah  was  common  to 
the  masses  composing  the  Saracenic  armies. 
The  woes  of  hell  and  the  blessings  of  a  sen- 
sual paradise  were  alike  motives  of  amazing 
power,  drawn  from  the  invisible  world,  to  in- 
duce the  lover  of  war  and  plunder  to  follow 
the  martial  seer  and  his  lieutenants. 

Both  worlds  were  given  to  the  faithful  Mos- 
lem soldier.  The  spoils  of  war  were  his ;  fair 
castles,  gardens,  and  conquered  provinces,  were 
the  just  possessions  of  the  successful.  If  they 
fell  in  battle,  they  rose  at  once  to  their  sensual 
rewards.  Silver  goblets,  fastened  on  diamonds 
filled  from  wine-bottles  never  before  opened, 
and  mingled  with  the  water  that  sparkles 
in  the  fountains  where  the  cherubim  drink, 
should  slake  their  thirst,  without  danger  of 
satiety  or  inebriation.  Beautiful  black-eyed 
virgins,  with  skin  as  white  as  polished  pearls, 
should  become  their  wives.     Keposing  on  ele- 

*  Ockley,  p.  3GG  :  Bo!m;  5th  Ed. 


76  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH 

vated  beds,  amid  verdant  fields,  gardens,  and 
fountains  of  exquisite  beauty,  and  bordered 
by  rivers  that  refresh  and  flow  forever,  the 
sufferer  should  find  the  compensations  for 
courage  and  for  death  in  the  field  of  battle. 
Motives  such  as  these,  presented  to  a  race  so 
ardent  and  impulsive,  kindled  the  wildest  en- 
thusiasm, and  vast  hordes  rose  from  their  soli- 
tudes and  followed  each  other  on  the  bloody 
trail  of  war  and  carnage. 

Ethiopia  and  Arabia  are  alike  the  prolific 
home  of  the  locust.  They  darken  the  air  in 
their  flight,  create  a  rushing  sound  with  their 
wings,  like  distant  thunder,  and  cover  a  fron- 
tier, it  is  said,  sometimes  of  five  hundred  miles. 
"This  plague,"  says  Pliny,  "is  considered  a 
manifestation  of  the  wrath  of  the  gods.  By 
their  numbers  they  darken  the  sun,  and  the 
nations  view  them  with  anxious  surprise. 
Their  strength  is  unfailing,  so  that  they  cross 
oceans  and  pervade  immense  tracts  of  land. 
They  cover  the  harvests  with  a  dreadful  cloud, 
their  very  touch  destroying  the  fruits  of  the 
earth,  and  their  bite  utterly  consuming  every 
thing." 

"The  quantity,"  says  Volney,  "of  these  in- 
sects is  incredible  to  all  who  have  not  them- 
selves  witnessed   their   astonishing   numbers. 


THE  SARACENS — TI1EIR   FANATIC  COURAGE.    77 

The  whole  earth  is  covered  with  them  for  the 
space  of  several  leagues.  The  noise  they 
make  in  browsing  on  the  trees  may  be  heard 
at  a  great  distance.  The  Tartars  themselves 
are  less  destructive  than  these  little  animals. 
One  would  imagine  that  fire  had  followed  their 
progress.  Wherever  their  myriads  spread,  the 
verdure  of  the  country  disappears;  trees  and 
plants  stripped  of  their  leaves  give  the  appear- 
ance of  winter  to  the  spring.  When  clouds 
of  them  take  their  flight,  the  heavens  are  lite- 
rally obscured  by  them." 

"  The  land  is  as  the  garden  of  Eden  before 
them,  and  behind  them  as  a  desolate  wilderness, 
yea,  and  nothing  shall  escape  them.  The  ap- 
pearance of  them  is  as  the  appearance  of  horses* 
....  Like  the  noise  of  chariots  on  the  tops  of 
the  mountains;  .  .  .  like  the  noise  of  a  flame 
of  fire  that  devoureth  the  stubble;  as  a  strong 
people  set  in  battle  array.  .  .  .  The  earth  shall 
quake  before  them,  the  heavens  shall  tremble, 
the  sun  and  the  moon  shall  be  dark,  and  the 

stars  shall  withdraw  their  shining The 

Lord  shall  utter  his  voice  before  his  army.  .  .  . 


*  "  Its  head  is  of  the  size  of  a  pea,  though  longer, — its 
forehead  pointing  downward^  like  the  handsome  Andalusian 
horse .' ' — Dillo n* s  Travels 


tb  ISIIMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

His  camp  is  very  great/'*  Saracenic  armies, 
issuing  from  the  home  of  the  locust,  and  like 
them  in  number  and  destructiveness  and  in 
many  other  respects,  are  said  by  the  prophet, 
metonymically,  to  be  those  insects  just  rising 
up  in  their  appalling  migrations. 

The  ungrateful  soil  of  the  Arab  returned 
him  no  remuneration  for  his  labour.  His  camel 
or  horse,  his  tent  and  scimitar,  constituted  his 
wealth  and  his  resources.  Always  on  the 
alert,  ever  armed,  governed  by  no  law  but  his 
will,  his  interest,  or  his  impulses,  his  conscience 
and  his  understanding  uninstructed,  his  saga- 
city and  his  emotional  nature  alone  strongly 
developed,  he  must  be  ranked  just  where  he 
has  ever  been, — with  the  most  impressible  of 
the  human  race.  A  verdant  field,  a  flowing 
river,  the  shadows  of  trees,  pendent  fruit  of  a 
most  delicious  flavour,  women  of  extraordinary 
beauty,  a  paradise  of  voluptuous  ecstasies; — 
the  ever-recurring  imagery  of  the  Koran,*)"  were 
the  appropriate  excitements  of  his  imaginative 
being,  the  prolific  sources  of  fanatic  courage 
and  religious  delusion. 

In   that   hotbed  of  cruelty   and   lust   over 


*  Joel  ii. 

■j*  De  Rycr's  Koran,  ch.  lxxxiii.  to  ch.  lxxxviii.,  inclusive. 


THE  SARACENS — THEIR  FANATIC  COURAGE.  70 

which  the  impostor  held  sway,  the  effusions  of 
Hara  had  become  an  incubation  of  intense 
activity,  as  they  settled  on  its  bosom  and 
invited  its  slumbering  myriads  into  aggressive 
life.  Never  did  an  army  more  effective,  of 
a  more  destructive  and  irresistible  fanaticism, 
rise  at  the  conjurations  of  a  wily  magician,  or 
evolve  from  the  dark  creations  of  a  heated 
imagination. 

A  turban,  unfurled  and  suspended  for  a 
banner  from  the  point  of  Boreida's  spear,  when 
the  forlorn  prophet  entered  Medina,  made  the 
yellow  head-dress  ever  after  the  distinguishing 
badge  of  his  Saracenic  disciples.*  It  became 
the  ornament  and  golden  crown  of  Moslem 
soldiers.  Their  long  black  tresses  escaping 
from  underneath  its  graceful  folds,  their  loose 
and  flowing  robes,  often  ornamented  with  rib- 
bons and  rich  silks,  (the  spoils  of  war,)  gave 
to  these  conquerors  of  the  world,  when  seen  in 
the  distance,  the  appearance  of  an  army  of 
women.  But  John's  nearer  view  of  them  cor- 
rected first  and  false  impressions :  they  had  the 
faces  of  men;  they  were  armed  for  war.  "  Their 
physical  structure  is  in  all  respects  more  per- 
fect than  that  of  Europeans,  their  organs  of 


*  The  Turks  wear  white  ones. 


80  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHUKCH. 

sense  exquisitely  acute,  their  size  above  the 
average  of  men  in  general,  their  figure  robust 
and  elegant."* 

Their  neatly-fitting  breastplates  were  worn 
not  for  ornament  but  for  use.  With  eyes  deep- 
set,  overshadowed  by  shaggy  eyebrows  and 
supported  by  high  cheek-bones,  with  mouths 
large,  teeth  prominent  and  carnivorous, — in  a 
word,  in  their  whole  aspect, — the  animal  pre- 
dominated over  the  man.  Their  look  was 
appalling;  their  battle-cry,  accompanying  the 
charge  of  their  rushing  squadrons,  loud  and 
courageous;  their  onset  irresistible.  It  was 
"  as  the  sound  of  chariots  of  many  horses  run- 
ning to  battle." 

Nothing  truly  peculiar  and  strikingly  cha- 
racteristic of  the  Moslem  invaders  escaped 
the  vision  of  John.f  The  compact  infantry  of 
the  Eomans  was  not  before  him  in  this  pano- 
rama. These  strange  soldiers  were  mounted, 
and  rushed  on  their  mission  of  wo  in  the 
saddle.  The  camel,  at  the  first  in  more  gene- 
ral use  among  the  poorer  classes  of  the  Mo- 
hammedans, soon  gave  place  to  the  horse, — 

*  Baron  De  Larrey,  surgeon-general  of  Napoleon's  army 
in  Egypt. 

t  Rev.  ix.  7-9. 


THE  SARACENS — THEIR  FANATIC  COURAGE.  81 

the  native  and  the  favourite  of  Yemen  and 
the  main  dependence  of  Saracenic  armies. 
Encumbered  by  no  baggage,  quartering,  like 
the  locust,  on  newly-appropriated  districts,  con- 
tinued enterprises  of  war  were  undertaken  at  a 
moment's  warning,  and  distant  cities,  assured 
of  safety  from  their  very  remoteness  from 
the  scenes  of  late  invasions  and  disasters,  were 
themselves  suddenly  stricken  and  oppressed. 
The  first  intimation  of  danger  arose  usually  from 
the  actual  perception  of  its  immediate  vicinity. 
At  break  of  day  there  is  perceived  an  unusual 
rush,  as  of  winds,  or  commotions  in  the  air, 
or  as  of  a  prolonged,  undulating  sound,  a  low 
tremulous  thunder,  in  the  earth.  It  reaches 
the  ear  of  the  sentinel  on  the  walls,  of  the 
citizen  in  the  gate,  of  the  mother  at  her  cradle, 
of  the  bride  at  her  toilet.  It  is  the  hostile 
camp  just  put  in  motion;  it  is  the  tramp  of  a 
hundred  thousand  horse.  Every  eye  is  now 
directed  toward  the  unprotected  and  invaded 
frontier.  A  long  waving  line  skirts  the  hori- 
zon ;  it  rises  higher  and  darker,  like  a  cloud  of 
locusts  just  taking  wing  in  myriads  from  the 
bosom  of  the  desert.  It  is  the  dust  from  the 
feet  of  the  Moslem  cavalry 


CHAPTER   X. 

MOHAMMED   AND   HIS   SUCCESSORS. 

"Earth  seems  a  garden  in  its  loveliest  dress 
Before  them,  and  behind  a  wilderness." 

COWPER. 

We  shall  now  take  our  leave  of  the  false 
prophet,  to  follow  those  that  succeeded  to  his 
bloody  throne  and  spread  his  martial  and  his 
ghostly  dominion.  Mohammed  at  his  death 
ceased  from  beins;  an  actor  in  the  scenes  that 
originated  from  the  effusions  of  the  pit.  He 
sent  out  its  smoke,  put  in  motion  those  im- 
portant social  convulsions  and  changes  which 
ended  in  the  establishment  of  his  faith  and  of 
his  government,  subverted  the  idolatry  and 
independence  of  his  native  country,  and  then 
disappeared  forever. 

The  army  that  had  sprung  up  around  him 
gave  to  his  "  dark  sentences"  a  more  compre- 
hensive meaning,  a  wider  range,  than  suited 
the  timidity  of  old  age  or  the  imbecility  inci- 
dent to  the  poison  he  had  imbibed  three  years 
before. 

82 


MOHAMMED   AND   HIS    SUCCESSORS.  83 

"After  his  return  to  Medina  from  his  late 
pilgrimage,"  says  Prideaux,  (pages  87-89.)  "he 
began  daily  to  decline  through  the  force  of 
that  poison  which  he  had  taken  three  years 
before  at  Kaabar,  which,  still  working  in  him, 
at  length  brought  him  so  low  as  forced  him,  on 
the  28th  day  of  Saphar,  (the  second  month  of 
the  year,)  to  take  his  bed ;  and  on  the  twelfth 
day  of  the  following  month  he  died,  after 
having  been  sick  thirteen  days 

"  The  beginning  of  his  sickness  was  a  slow 
fever,  which  at  length  made  him  delirious; 
whereon  he  -called  for  a  pen,  ink,  and  paper, 
telling  them  that  he  would  dictate  a  book  to 
them  which  should  keep  them  from  erring  after 

his  death Daring  his  sickness  he  much 

complained  of  the  bit*  which  he  had  taken  at 
Kaabar,  telling  those  that  came  to  visit  him 
that  he  had  felt  the  torments  of  it  in  his  body 
ever  since;  that  at  times  it  brought  on  him 
very  dolorous  pains,  and  that  then  it  was  going 
to  break  his  very  heart-strings.  And  when, 
among  others,  there  came  to  see  him  the  mother 
of  Bashar,  who  died  on  the  spot  of  that  poison, 
he  cried  out,  '  0  mother  of  Bashar,  the  veins 
of  my  heart  are  now  breaking  of  the  bit  which 

*  Meat  poisoned  by  a  female. 


84  ISHMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

I  eat  with  your  son  at  Kaabar.'  ....  Some  of 
his  followers  would  have  had  him  buried  at 
Mecca,  some  at  Jerusalem,  others  at  Medina. 
Abu  Beker,  coming  in,  told  them  that  he  had 
often  heard  from  the  prophet  himself  that 
prophets  were  to  be  buried  in  the  place  where 
they  died ;  and  then,  without  more  ado,  com- 
manded the  bed  whereon  he  lay  to  be  plucked 
out,  and  a  grave  to  be  immediately  dug  under 
it,  to  which  all  consented;  and  there  they 
buried  him  forthwith,  in  the  place  where  he 
died,  which  was  in  the  chamber  of  Ayesha, 
his  best-beloved  wife,  at  Medina ;  and  there  he 
lietli  to  this  day,  without  an  iron  coffin  or 
loadstones  to  hang  him  in  the  air,  as  the 
stories  which  commonly  go  about  of  him 
among  Christians  fabulously  relate." 

The  flame  of  an  unholy  ambition,  in  any 
event,  had  spent  itself  in  the  frame  which  it 
had  excited  and  consumed.  He  had  become 
weary  of  long  marches  and  sieges,  of  exposures 
and  privations.  The  prospects  of  distant  and 
dangerous  campaigns  filled  the  prematurely 
old  and  infirm  pretender  with  pacific  inten- 
tions. His  councils  were  now  shaped  to  re- 
press the  ardour  of  his  followers.  But  the 
locust  horde  had  already  taken  wing, — had  in- 
herited a  destructive  nature  with  all  the  energy 


MOHAMMED   AND  HIS   SUCCESSORS.  85 

of  its  young  and  ungratified  propensities ;  and 
scarcely  had  his  body  sunk  to  its  last  resting- 
place  in  the  earth,  underneath  the  bedchamber 
of  Ayesha,  in  Medina,  a.d.  632,*  when  the 
bloody  drama  which  his  inventive  genius  had 
prepared  was  opened  in  Asia  by  his  fierce  lieu- 
tenants. The  world,  through  other  leaders, 
felt  the  shock  of  his  now  palsied  arm. 

"The  evil  that  men  do  lives  after  them." 
Mohammed,  like  his  famed  progenitor,  had 
left  a  sad  legacy  to  the  world.  Both  stand 
out  by  themselves  in  a  solitary  and  gloomy 
grandeur  of  nature,  with  the  awful  capabilities 
of  impressing  their  ruinous  individualities  on 
the  men  of  their  own  times  and  of  making 
their  own  deep  footprints  the  highway  of 
af ter-gener  ation  s . 

The  caliphs  gave  perpetuity  to  a  creed 
which  they  embraced  with  sincere  and  fanatic 
zeal,  snatched  from  the  failing  grasp  of  their 
dying  prophet  the  whip  of  scorpions,  and  be- 
came in  their  turn  the  propagandists  of  his 

*  Mohammed  was  evidently  delirious  at  his  death.  His 
call  for  materials  to  write  a  new  book  just  before  he 
breathed  his  last  is  in  evidence  of  this ;  and  his  last  words, 
"  0  God,  pardon  my  sins  !  yes,  I  come  among  my  fellow- 
citizens  on  high!"  should  not  be  put  down  as  evidence  of 
his  sincerity,  but  of  mental  aberration. 


86  ISIBIAEL    AND    THE    CHURCH. 

imposture  and  the  scourge  of  the  world.  In 
the  first  great  battle  of  the  Moslems  with  a 
foreign  foe  at  Muta,  "  Zeid  fell  like  a  soldier 
in  the  foremost  ranks.  The  death  of  Jaafar 
was  heroic  and  memorable.  He  lost  his 
right  hand;  he  shifted  the  standard  to  his 
left.  The  left  was  severed  from  his  body; 
he  embraced  the  standard  with  his  bleeding 
stumps  till  he  was  transfixed  to  the  ground 
with  fifty  honourable  wounds.  ''Advance!' 
cried  Abdallah,  who  stepped  into  the  vacant 
place;  '  either  victory  or  paradise  is  our  own  !' 
The  lance  of  a  Eoman  decided  the  alternative ; 
but  the  falling  standard  was  rescued  by  Caled, 
the  proselyte  of  Mecca;  nine  swords  were 
broken  in  his  hands,  and  his  valour  withstood 
and  repulsed  the  superior  number  of  the 
Christians. 

"Caled  is  renowned  among  his  brethren  and 
his  enemies  by  the  glorious  appellation  of 
the  sword  of  God."*  His  shout  was  louder 
than  that  of  Mohammed,  his  agility  and  his 
strength  that  of  the  tigeiyj-  his  cruelty  as  un- 

*  Gibbon,  vol.  v.  p.  141. 

■}■  "While  lie  was  fighting  with  one  of  the  Greeks,  his 
sword  broke  in  his  hand;  but,  closing  with  his  adversary,  he 
squeezed  him  so  hard  that  he  broke  his  ribs  and  then  threw 
him  down  dead  from  off  his  horse."' — Oclley,  p.  193. 


MOHAMMED   AND   HIS    SUCCESSORS.  87 

relenting.  Over  his  head  waved  the  stand- 
ard of  the  black  eagle ;  and  his  battle-cry,  as 
he  rushed  to  his  banquet  of  blood,  sent  a  thrill 
of  terror  to  the  hearts  of  the  brave. 

When  he  led  his  troops  into  Damascus,  his 
ears  were  deaf  to  the  supplications  of  the  con- 
quered. The  bitter  wail  that  rose  around  him 
was  drowned  by  his  voice.  It  thundered  along 
the  crowded  street,  lined  with  murderers : — 
"  No  quarters  to  the  unbelievers !  no  quarters !" 
Obeidah  had  entered  the  town  at  another  point 
and  had  granted  the  prayer  of  the  trembling 
Damascenes ;  midway  met  the  rival  chiefs  and 
the  tides  of  war  and  peace.  The  enraged  Caled 
claimed  that  Obeidah's  grant  was  invalid  and 
an  invasion  of  privilege.  "  The  unbelievers," 
shouted  the  gaunt  murderer,  u  shall  perish  by 
the  sword!  Fall  on  !"* 

When  Caled  became  a  proselyte,  he  was  com- 
missioned by  Mohammed  to  destroy  the  re- 
maining idols  of  Arabia.  His  cruelty  to  the 
Jodhamites  shocked  even  the  remorseless  pro- 
phet himself.  For,  after  many  were  taken 
prisoners,  he  tied  the  hands  of  numbers  behind 
their  backs  and  put  them  all  to  the  sword.f 

Before  his  death  he  was  charged  with  em- 


*  Mil.  Gib.  cli.  51.  f  Oekley,  p.  55. 


88  ISHMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

bezzlement.  "An  examination  was  accord- 
ingly instituted,  with  every  indignity,  and  his 
turban  fastened  round  his  neck  in  the  igno- 
minious grasp  of  the  common  crier.  .  .  .  The 
imposition  of  a  fine  satisfied  the  public  justice ; 
but  when  his  horse,  his  armour,  and  one  slave, 
wrere  found  to  constitute  all  his  wealth,  Omar 
deigned  to  weep  over  the  tomb,  at  Emesa,  of 
the  injured  conqueror  of  Syria."*  Such  were 
the  fierce  whelps  that  howled  for  the  prey  as 
soon  as  their  leashes  were  dropped  by  the  de- 
parted Mohammed.  Mischief  was  afoot,  and 
its  inevitable  march  was  down  the  waste  of 
years. 

*  Major  Pierce,  in  note  to  Ockley,  p.  255 


CHAPTER   XL 

THE    SARACENS,  A    SCOURGE    TO  CHRISTENDOM. 

"Their  torment  was  as   the  torment  of  a   scorpion  when  he 
striketh  a  man." — Rev.  ix.  5. 

The  locust,  though  destructive  to  vegetation, 
is  not  malignant  in  its  disposition  or  poisonous 
in  its  bite  or  sting.  It  became  necessary, 
therefore,  as  inspiration  would  represent  the 
true  character  of  the  woe,  to  introduce  into 
the  description  of  it  another  insect  or  reptile 
common  to  the  torrid  zone,  and  of  extra- 
ordinary and  deadly  irascibility.  Said  the 
prophet,  "And  they  had  tails  like  unto 
scorpions,  and  they  had  stings  in  their  tails. 
Their  torment  was  as  the  torment  of  a  scor- 
pion when  he  striketh  a  man." 

The  sting  of  a  scorpion  is  a  sharp-pointed 
downward  curve  at  the  end  of  his  tail;  and, 
when  excited,  he  raises  it  and  inflicts  a  deadly 
wound.  The  stroke  is  sudden  and  without 
warning.  The  poison— a  cold,  colourless  fluid 
— oozes  out  with  either  the  exertion  or  pres- 

8*  F  89 


90  ISHMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

sure  attending  the  stroke,  or  both  combined;, 
and  is  left  in  the  incision  made.  It  is  very 
diffusive.  It  is  taken  up  at  once  into  the  cir- 
culation, and  assimilates  in  a  very  short  time 
the  whole  mass  of  the  fluids,  the  wound  itself 
remaining  but  slightly  inflamed. 

Such  was  the  venom  of  that  spiritual  poison 
in  the  creed  of  the  false  prophet.  It  was 
left  behind  in  every  conquered  country,  to 
assimilate  every  thing  to  its  own  nature.  Its 
stealthy  approach  was  unobserved,  like  that 
of  the  scorpion  in  the  footpath,  until  it,  or 
the  resistless  stroke  of  the  scimitar,  or  a  life 
of  bondage,  became  the  alternatives  to  be  at 
once  chosen,  and  that  without  debate.  Many 
chose  death;  and  torrents  of  Christian  blood 
were  rained  upon  the  pavements  of  fallen 
cities.  Many  chose  to  pay  tribute,  and  to  drag 
out  a  sickly  being  under  heavy  exactions  and 
most  destructive  religious  prohibitions.  Others 
chose  at  once  to  imbibe  the  poison  and  to  pur- 
chase social  and  political  equality  among  their 
conquerors  by  an  open  and  shameless  apostasy. 

Said  Eomanus,  the  fallen  governor  of  Boz- 
rah,  "I  renounce  your  society,  both  in  this 
world  and  in  the  world  to  come ;  and  I  deny 
Him  that  was  crucified  and  whosoever  wor- 
ships  him;   and   I  choose  God  for  my  Lord, 


THE   SARACENS,   A    SCOURGE.  91 

Islam  for  my  faith,  Mecca  for  my  temple,  the 
Moslem  for  my  brethren,  and  Mohammed  for 
my  prophet,  who  was  sent  to  lead  men  into 
the  right  way  and  to  exalt  the  true  religion  in 
spite  of  all  those  who  join  partners  with  God."* 

A  venerable  Greek,  issuing  on  one  occasion 
from  an  army  of  seventy  thousand  Christians, 
offered  presents  and  terms  of  peace  to  the  in- 
vader of  Syria;  but  Caled's  reply  was,  "Ye 
Christian  dogs!  ye  know  your  option.  The 
Koran,  the  tribute,  or  the  sword/'f 

When  the  Moslems  sat  down  before  the 
gates  of  a  besieged  Christian  city,  the  sum- 
mons to  surrender  ran  usually  in  the  following 
terms  : — "  We  require  you  to  testify  that  there 
is  but  one  God,  and  that  Mohammed  is  the 
prophet  of  God." 

"In  the  name  of  the  most  merciful  God. 
From  Abu  Obeidah  Ebn  Aljirahh  to  the  chief 
commanders  of  the  people  of  iEliahJ  and  the 
inhabitants  thereof.  Health  and  happiness 
to  every  one  that  follows  the  right  way  and 
believes  in  God  and  the  apostle.  We  require 
of  you  to  testify  that  there  is  but  one  God,  and 
Mohammed  is  his  apostle,  and  that  there  shall 

*  Gibbon,  vol.  v.  p.  192. 

-j-  Ibid.  p.  195.  J  Jerusalem. 


92  ISHMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

be  a  day  of  judgment  when  God  shall  raise 
the  dead  out  of  their  sepulchres ;  and  when 
you  have  borne  witness  to  this,  it  is  unlawful 
for  us  either  to  shed  your  blood  or  meddle  with 
your  substance  or  children.  If  you  refuse  this, 
consent  to  pay  tribute  and  be  under  us  forth- 
with; otherwise  I  shall  bring  men  against  you 
who  love  death  better  than  you  do  the  drink- 
ing of  wine  or  eating  of  hogs'  flesh  ;  nor  will  I 
ever  stir  from  you,  if  it  please  God,  till  I  have 
destroyed  those  that  fight  for  you  and  made 
slaves  of  your  children."* 

Those  who  consented  to  these  terms  im- 
bibed the  poison  of  a  false  faith  in  its  dead- 
liest form.  That  was  a  scorpion-sting  indeed, 
which  penetrated  to  the  very  soul,  corrupted 
the  blood  of  an  immortal  nature,  and  brought 
on  the  endless  horrors  of  the  second  death. 
He  who  embraced  that  creed  perished ;  for  he 
sinned  against  the  remedy  itself:  and  what  sin 
could  be  more  mortal?  For,  though  he  ex- 
alted God  in  his  unity,  he  in  the  next  breath 
degraded  him  in  his  Son.  This  was  the  sting 
in  the  tail, —  the  venom  of  the  scorpion  left 
behind;  and  this  was  it  that  was  ever  de- 
manded, while  the  scimitar,  dripping  with  gore, 

*  Ockley,  p.  206 


A   SCOURGE.  93 

waved  over  the  head  of  the  fallen  disciple.    It 
was  the  deadliest  sting  in  the  Saracenic  woe. 

The  stroke  of  the  scorpion,  though  gene- 
rally, was  not  uniformly,  fatal;  perhaps  be- 
cause its  most  concentrated  venom  failed  to 
bo  always  ejected  into  the  wound.  Those  that 
survived,  however,  lost  their  vigour  and  viva- 
city, and  sank  to  an  early  grave  from  the 
effects  of  the  poison, — a  true  and  sad  picture 
of  an  expiring  Christianity  consuming  away 
under  Mohammedan  exactions,  prohibitions, 
and  influences.  The  masses  of  those  who 
purchased  life  and  toleration  by  paying  tri- 
bute were  gradually  either  absorbed  and  lost 
to  the  church  in  an  amalgamation  with  the 
social  and  religious  habits  of  their  conquerors, 
or  were  led  in  despair  to  emigrate  to  distant 
lands.  The  vast  regions  that  stretch  from 
India  across  Asia  and  Africa  to  the  Atlantic, 
and  a  part  of  Europe,  became  Mohammedan 
countries.  Over  all  these  fair  Christian  pro- 
vinces the  scorpion  made  his  disgusting  trail 
and  left  everywhere  his  deadly  venom.  Those 
who  were  not  at  once  destroyed  were  doomed 
to  experience  a  torment,  to  fall  into  a  despond- 
ency and  a  despair,  like  to  that  which  the  scor- 
pion diffuses  through  life's  wasting  fountains 
"when  it  striketh  a  man." 


94  ISHMAEL    AND    THE    CHURCH. 

It  is  of  all  reptiles  the  most  irascible  and 
destructive.  Shut  up  under  a  glass  with  the 
mouse,  the  spider, — yea,  with  even  its  own 
kind, — it  will  at  once  commence  a  deadly  feud 
with  all,  and  will  fight  till  it  destroy  or  be 
destroyed.  A  female,  it  is  related,  killed  all 
its  offspring  successively  but  one.  That  one, 
more  vigorous  than  the  rest,  sprung  upon  the 
back  of  its  unnatural  mother  and  stung  her 
to  death.  It  is  said  that,  when  highly  exas- 
perated, the  undaunted  suicide  will  kill  itself 
with  the  stroke  of  its  own  tail. 

Such  traits  are  remarkably  illustrative  of 
the  irascible  and  destructive  dispositions  of 
the  descendants  of  Ishmael  as  they  appeared 
prior  to  the  advent  of  Mohammed  among  them. 
They  have  since  then  been  put  under  a  reli- 
gious discipline  which  restrains  their  tendency 
to  kill  one  another.  Their  animosities  are  no 
longer  optional  and  impulsive,  but  organized  and 
obligatory.  The  Koran  pours  its  venom  round 
the  Moslem's  heart,  and  makes  its  outworkings 
toward  all  others  but  the  ordinary  evidences 
of  his  religious  sincerity.  It  requires  that  no 
debate  be  had  with  unbelievers;  that  all  gain- 
saying should  be  ended  at  once  by  the  thrust 
of  the  spear  or  the  sword. 

"  Pray,"  said  Omar,  "  mind  what  I  say  to 


95 


you :  if  any  man  makes  profession  of  our  re- 
ligion, and  then  leaves  it,  we  kill  him."* 

Omar,  in  the  course  of  an  address,  quoted 
this  passage  from  the  Koran :  — "  He  whom 
God  shall  direct  is  led  in  the  right  way;  but 
thou  shalt  not  find  a  friend  to  direct  him 
aright  whom  God  shall  lead  into  error."  A 
Christian  priest  that  sat  before  him  stood  up 
and  said,  "  God  leads  no  man  into  error,"  and 
repeated  it.  Omar  said  nothing  to  him,  but 
bade  those  that  stood  by  strike  off  his  head  if 
he  should  say  so  again.f 

While  success  attended  the  arms  of  the 
Saracens,  they  seem  to  have  laid  aside  alto- 
gether their  former  domestic  retaliations.  Dis- 
appointment and  defeat,  however,  rouses  the 
latent  fury  of  their  nature  still,  and  even  the 
precepts  of  the  Koran  prove  at  such  conjunc- 
tures an  insufficient  restraint.  The  finest  army 
they  ever  marshalled,  when  partially  defeated 
by  Charles  Martel,  became  enraged  at  the  severe 
handling  they  were  receiving  from  the  heavy 
blows  of  the  Normans,  and,  without  any  other 
assignable  reason,  cut  each  other  in  pieces. 

*  Ockley,  p.  209.  f  Ockley,  pp.  210-11. 


CHAPTER  XII. 

THE    SARACENS,  A   SCOURGE    TO   CHRISTENDOM. 

CONTINUED. 

"And  in  those  days  shall  men  seek  death  and  shall  not  find  it;  and 
shall  desire  to  die,  and  death  shall  flee  from  them."— Rev.  ix.  6. 

It  is  simply  fanciful  to  interpret  this  of  the 
fanatic  Derar,  and  perhaps  a  very  few  others 
of  the  Moslems,  who  sought  or  seemed  to  court 
death  for  the  purpose  of  joining  at  an  earlier 
hour  their  black-eyed  wives  in  paradise ;  since 
it  is  the  intention  of  the  Evangelist,  obviously, 
to  describe  the  woe  as  it  was  seen  to  affect 
those  on  whom  it  fell. 

"Oppression  maketh  a  wise  man  mad;"  but 
there  are  forms  of  it  that  tempt  even  to 
suicide.  Among  men  of  conscience  and  of 
courage,  though  at  the  same  time  destitute 
of  true  piety,  the  alternative  of  death  was 
often  sought  in  posts  of  danger  and  in  fields 
of  battle  to  avoid  a  constrained  apostasy,  a 
base  submission,  or  the  sight  of  domestic 
violation    and    dishonour.      And    even    here, 

96 


THE   SARACENS,  A   SCOURGE.  07 

amid  falling  and  flying  thousands,  though 
covered  with  many  wounds,  death  fled  their 
eager  embrace.  And,  as  their  religious  princi- 
ples would  not  allow  them  to  inflict  a  volun- 
tary death-stroke  with  their  own  hands  upon 
themselves,  they  envied  their  more  fortunate 
brethren-in-arms  who  had  sought  and  who  had 
obtained  the  gift  to  die. 

Sad  indeed  it  was  to  hear  the  jackal  growl 
and  the  raven  croak  in  the  fields  of  the  slain; 
but  sadder  far  to  hear  the  Moslem  shout  as  he 
bore  away  a  wife  or  a  daughter  to  his  harem; 
to  endure  his  look  of  scorn  for  holy  things  and 
holy  ties ;  to  see  his  strong  hand  bear  aloft  the 
standard  of  the  black  eagle,  plant  it  on  Chris- 
tian battlements,  and  unfold  and  wave  it  in 
triumph  over  the  broken  crucifixes  and  tram- 
pled images  of  Jesus.  Oh,  the  living  madness 
of  this  form  of  the  woe !  It  was  heaven's  whip 
of  scorpions,  to  torment  before  the  time,  in  the 
visible  church,  those  that  repented  not  of  their 
thefts,  idolatries,  and  persecutions. 

How  terrible  was  the  doom  of  Babylon,  and 
how  signal  as  to  the  time  and  manner  of  its  in- 
fliction !  In  the  sumptuous  halls  of  its  palace 
were  gathered  the  impious  revellers.  The  ves- 
sels of  Jehovah's  temple  were  brought  forth, 
drink-offerings  poured  out;  and  all  united  in 

9 


98  ISHMAEL   AND   TUE    CHURCH. 

praising  the  idols  of  silver  and  of  gold.  Sud- 
denly above  their  heads  appeared  the  hand- 
writing on  the  wall;  and,  while  princes  and 
courtiers  were  seeking  to  define  their  terror  and 
restore  their  courage,  the  battle-cry  of  Cyrus  is 
heard  : — "  Awake,  ye  princes,  and  anoint  the 
shield  !"  His  soldiers  rush  through  the  opened 
gates,  and  the  blood  of  the  revellers  is  mingled 
with  their  sacrifices.  Said  the  prophet,  "  It  is 
the  vengeance  of  the  Lord,  the  vengeance  of 
his  temple." 

The  Christian  church,  the  vast  visible  temple 
of  the  Holy  Ghost,  was  now  again  likewise 
profaned  in  the  East  and  in  the  West,  and  God 
again  went  through  it,  armed  with  a  whip  of 
scorpions  twisted  long  before  and  prepared  to 
his  hand,  driving  out  thence  the  vile  priest  reek- 
ing with  lust,  blood,  and  simony,  overturning 
the  tables  of  the  money-changers  and  trampling 
images  and  crucifixes  underneath  his  burning 
feet.  The  Saracenic  woe,  destructive  though  it 
was,  had  a  divine  commission :  "it  was  the 
vengeance  of  the  Lord,  the  vengeance  of  his 
temple." 

"And  in  those  days  shall  men  seek  death, 
and  shall  not  find  it,  and  shall  desire  to  die, 
and  death  shall  flee  from  them." 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

MOHAMMED  PROTECTING   THE    TRUE  CHURCH  : 
THE    NESTORIANS. 

"  They  lived  unknown 
Till  persecution  dragged  them  into  fame 
And  chased  them  up  to  heaven." 

Cowper  ;   Task,  p.  763. 

The  locusts  were  commanded  to  subsist  on 
that  which  they  were  never  known  to  select 
for  food.  How  like  the  Arab  (the  bosom  of 
whose  deserts  had  from  time  immemorial  been 
covered  with  idols)  violating  the  cherished  in- 
stincts of  ages  in  making  war  upon  the  world's 
idolatry ! 

The  locusts  were  also  commanded  not  to 
hurt  that  which  they  were  never  known  to 
spare.  "  It  was  commanded  them  that  they 
should  not  hurt  the  grass  of  the  earth,  neither 
any  green  thing,  neither  any  tree;  but  only 
those  men  who  have  not  the  seal  of  God  in 
their  foreheads."  Ishmaei's  animosities  to  true 
religion,  ever  natural  and  ever  injurious  both 
before  the  rise  and  after  the  fall  of  the  empire 

99 


100  ISHMAEL   AND    THE    CHURCH. 

of  the  caliphs,  were,  during  its  continuance, 
required  to  be  put  under  most  effectual  re- 
straint. 

The  Saracens  were  not  to  make  war  in  any 
event  upon  the  sealed.  Wherever  else  the 
blight  of  their  shadow  might  fall  or  the  stroke 
of  their  vengeance  smite,  the  living  verdure 
must  remain  unharmed  on  the  slopes  of  Zion, 
the  olive  nourish  unmolested  in  the  courts  of 
the  Lord,  and  no  axe  be  raised  to  fell  the  ever- 
greens that  waved  over  Lebanon. 

The  exception  is  comprehensive  and  dis- 
criminative. It  includes  each  organized  fra- 
ternity of  true  believers.  These  were  as  con- 
spicuous for  their  purifying  and  persevering 
testimony  as  were  the  image-worshippers  for 
their  impiety,  whose  degenerate  Christianity 
they  rejected  and  whose  oppressions  they  bore. 
IT  was  the  seal  that  heaven  had  placed  on 
their  open  and  manly  brow.  To  point  them 
out,  to  vindicate  their  injured  fame,  and  to 
trace  their  progress  and  preservation  under 
this  most  singular  protectorate,  will  be  made 
the  agreeable  toil  of  a  passing  hour. 

The  worship  of  the  Virgin  Mary  is  not  only 
deeply  rooted  in  the  Greek  and  Latin  sects,  but 
it  was  the  earliest  form  and  evidence  of  their 
apostasy.     By  the  true  church  Mary  has  ever 


TIIE   NESTORIANS.  101 

been  regarded  as  a  subject  of  the  fall,  a  sinner 
saved  by  grace,  the  mother  of  our  Lord's  human- 
ity, as  probably  the  mother  of  other  children,* 
and  not  properly  as  the  mother  of  God  or  the 
proper  object  of  religious  veneration. 

In  A.d.  428,  the  presbyter  Anastasius  pub- 
licly and  earnestly  condemned  the  title  Oeoroxog, 
"mother  of  God,"  given  to  Mary.  Xpigroxog, 
"mother  of  Christ,"  he  insisted,  was  far  more 
expressive  of  the  truth  on  this  point  both  in 
divinity  and  philosophy.  Deity  could  not  be 
born,  and  humanity  alone  could  derive  its 
being  from  a  human  parent.  Nestorius  de- 
fended these  views ;  and  the  controversy  thus 
originated  in  Constantinople  spread  through- 
out the  church.  Numbers  of  the  pious  and 
the  learned  in  Asia  and  Africa  held  and  de- 
fended the  same  Scriptural  views. 

Cyril,  Bishop  of  Alexandria,  procured  the 
calling  of  a  council  at  Ephesus,  A.d.  431,  in 
which  he  presided,  and,  without  waiting  for 
the  arrival  of  the  Eastern  bishops,  or  even  the 
decencies  of  apparent  justice,  deprived  Nesto- 
rius of  his  episcopate  and  banished  him  into 
a  solitary  place  in  the  deserts  of  Egypt.  Here 
he  died,  a.d.  435.    Thus  commenced  the  contro- 

*  Matt.  i.  25 ;   Luke  ii.  7. 
9* 


102  ISHMAEL   AND   THE    CHUKCH. 

versy  and  the  persecution.  But  the  Nestorians, 
with  unbroken  resolution,  upheld  the  primitive 
faith,  refused  all  divine  honours  to  the  Virgin, 
and  were  numerous  and  powerful  throughout 
the  East. 

Proscribed  and  persecuted  by  the  Greeks 
and  Latins,  they  penetrated  the  interior  of 
Arabia,  Transoxiana,  and  even  China.  Their 
sufferings  inflamed  their  zeal  and  awakened 
the  pity  of  savage  breasts. 

The  celebrated  "Testament  of  Mohammed" 
is  among  the  earliest  productions  of  the  Ara- 
bian prophet,  and  originated,  it  is  believed,  in 
his  sympathy  for  them.  If  not  written  by  his 
own  hand,  it  is  all  the  same  to  us  in  the  pre- 
mises, since  in  the  solemn  convictions  of  the 
Saracens  it  was  so  written,  did  contain  his 
signature  and  seal,  and  its  provisions  were  con- 
sequently sacredly  heeded  and  carried  out  by 
them. 

This  extraordinary  document  secured  to  the 
Nestorians  freedom  from  service  in  war,  per- 
fect toleration  of  their  customs  and  laws,  ex- 
emption of  their  clergy  from  tribute,  imposed  a 
moderate  tax  on  their  people;  and  even  their 
poor  serving-maids  employed  in  Mohammedan 
families  were  to  be  permitted  to  observe  all  the 
ceremonies  or  fasts  enjoined  by  their  church, 


THE    NESTORIANS.  103 

and  to  have  no  restraint  whatever  put  upon 
their  Christian  liberty. 

"As  to  this  testament,"  says  Maclane,  "  whe- 
ther it  be  genuine  or  spurious,  it  is  certain  that 
its  contents  were  true,  since  many  learned  men 
have  fully  proved  that  the  pseudo-prophet,  at 
his  first  setting  out,  prohibited  in  the  strongest 
manner  the  commission  of  all  sorts  of  injuries 
against  the  Christians,  and  especially  the  Nes- 
torians."*  The  fall  of  Persia  and  of  Asia  into 
the  hands  of  the  Saracens  procured  therefore, 
for  these  persecuted  disciples,  privileges  which 
they  did  not  previously  possess,  and  which 
they  chronicle  with  pious  gratitude. 

"Even  the  Arabs,"  writes  Jesujabus,  their 
patriarch,  "on  whom  the  Almighty  has  in 
these  days  bestowed  the  dominion  of  the  earth, 
are  among  us,  as  thou  knowest ;  yet  they  do 
not  persecute  the  Christian  religion,  but,  on  the 
contrary,  they  commend  our  faith  and  commend 
the  priests  and  saints  of  the  Lord,  conferring 
benefits  on  his  churches  and  convents.''^ 

When  the  vicar  of  Mohammed  had  collected 
troops  for  the  invasion  of  Syria,  his  language 
in  his  instructions  to  his  lieutenants  and  army 
is  in  conformity  with  the  provisions  of  this 

*  Maclane's  note  in  Mosheim,  vol.  i.  p.  183 
f  Assemani,  vol.  iii.  p.  131. 


104      ISHMAEL  AND  1HE  CHURCH. 

testament "  Destroy  no  palm-trees  nor 

burn  any  fields  of  corn;  cut  down  no  fruit- 
trees  nor  do  any  mischief  to  cattle As 

you  go  on  you  will  find  some  religious  persons 
who  live  retired  in  monasteries  and  propose 
to  themselves  to  serve  God  in  that  way.  Let 
them  alone,  and  neither  kill  them  nor  destroy 
their  monasteries.  And  you  will  find  another 
sort  of  people,  that  belong  to  the  synagogue  of 
Satan,  who  have  shaven  crowns;  be  sure  you 
cleave  their  skulls,  and  give  them  no  quarter 
till  they  either  turn  Mohammedans  or  pay 
tribute."* 

Even  as  late  as  the  seventh  century  the 
monasteries  were  occupied  by  laymen.  They 
wore  their  hair  long ;  but  when  they  became 
priests  they  shaved  the  hair  from  the  top  of 
their  heads. 

The  words  used  by  the  apostle  and  by  the 
caliph  are  strikingly  similar.  It  is  as  though, 
through  the  vista  of  years,  and  in  the  bosom 
of  the  desert,  John  had  seen  Abubeker  ascend 
a  hill,  review  his  troops,  and  had  heard  and 
did  but  recite  his  very  words,  when  he  said, 
"It  was  commanded  them  that  they  should 
not  hurt  the  grass  of  the  earth,  neither  any 
green  thing,  neither  any  tree,  but  only  those 

*  Gibbon,  vol.  v.  p.  188. 


TIIE    NESTORIANS.  105 

men  that  had  not  the  seal  of  God  in  their 
foreheads."  It  is  as  though  he  intended  to 
select  at  least  just  so  much  of  that  remarkable 
charge  to  the  Moslem  army  as  should  serve  to 
identify  it  with  the  very  woe  to  which  he  re- 
ferred, as  protective  with  respect  to  the  sealed, 
and  as  containing  heaven's  cup  of  trembling  to 
image-worshippers. 

"When  Heraclius,  the  emperor,  expressed 
his  astonishment  at  this  extraordinary  suc- 
cess of  the  Arabs,  who  were  inferior  to  the 
Greeks  both  in  number,  strength,  arms,  and 
discipline,  after  a  short  silence,  a  grave  man 
stood  up  and  told  him  that  the  reason  of  it 
was  that  the  Greeks  had  walked  unworthily 
of  their  Christian  profession,  and  changed  their 
religion  from  what  it  was  when  Jesus  Christ 
first  delivered  it  to  them,  injuring  and  oppress- 
ing one  another,  taking  usury,  committing 
fornication,  and  fomenting  all  manner  of  strife 
and  variance  among  themselves.  And,  indeed, 
the  vices  of  these  Christians  were  at  that  time 
so  flagrant  as  to  make  them  offensive  to  the 
very  infidels,  as  confessed  by  the  Greek  writers 
themselves  and  exaggerated  by  the  Arabic 
ones.  The  emperor  answered,  'That  he  was 
too  sensible  of  it.'  "* 


*  Ockley,  pp.  194,  196. 
G 


106  ISHMAEL    AND   THE   CHURCH. 

All  the  countries  over  which  the  Csesars 
bore  sway,  with  but  limited  exceptions,  had 
in  the  seventh  century  joined  the  general  de- 
fection from  Christ,  and  were  regarded  by  the 
invaders  as  doomed  to  the  sword,  as  Canaan 
had  previously  been  to  that  of  Joshua.  The 
idols  of  a  fallen  paganism  had  revived  every- 
where, as  by  enchantment,  and,  adorned  with 
holy  garments  and  gilded  crosses  and  named 
after  Jesus,  Mary,  the  apostles  and  martyrs, 
were  set  up  and  worshipped  in  all  the  sanctu- 
aries of  Christendom.  Men  with  bare  feet 
and  shaven  crowns  conducted  the  idolatrous 
services  of  the  people,  and  often  bore  the  idols 
on  the  walls  of  besieged  towns  and  along  the 
lines  of  Christian  armies,  to  inspire  devotion 
and  courage.  Even  in  the  recesses  of  the 
desert  they  were  known  as  the  priesthood  of 
an  apostate  church,  and  are  hence  specifically 
designated  by  the  indignant  caliph  as  not  the 
limit,  but  the  butt,  of  the  woe. 

The  exception  in  favour  of  the  refugees  of  the 
monasteries  originated,  doubtless,  in  the  deep 
veneration  felt  for  the  testament  of  the  Arabian 
prophet.  When  the  battle  raged  around  the 
monastery  of  the  holy  fathers,  about  thirty  miles 
from  Damascus,  the  monastery  was  spared;  and 
the  priest,  though  he  treated   with  scorn  the 


THE    NESTORIANS.  107 

bloody  Caled,  was  not  slain.  Said  the  chief, 
curbing  his  rage,* — "if  the  apostle  of  God,  of 
blessed  memory,  had  not  commanded  us  to  let 
such  men  as  you  alone,  you  should  not  have 
escaped  any  more  than  the  rest,  but  I  would 
have  put  you  to  a  most  cruel  death." 

"The  successors  of  Mohammed  in  Persia 
employed  the  Nestorians  in  the  most  important 
affairs  both  of  the  cabinet  and  of  the  pro- 
vinces, and  suffered  the  patriarch  of  that  sect 
alone  to  reside  in  the  kingdom  of  Bagdad."* 
Under  the  caliphs,  the  Nestorians  continued  to 
flourish.  From  Persia  to  China  their  metro- 
politan sees  dotted  the  whole  interior  of  Eastern 
Asia.  But  when  the  Turks  arose  and  intro- 
duced the  second  woe,  they  were  brought  under 
another  sort  of  men,  to  whom  it  had  not  been 
said,  "Hurt  not  the  grass  of  the  earth,  neither 
any  green  thing,  neither  any  tree,  but  only 
those  men  who  have  not  the  seal  of  God  in 
their  foreheads."  It  is  not  the  divine  purpose 
always  to  preserve  his  people  from  persecu- 
tion: their  preservation,  on  the  contrary,  is  an 
exception  at  any  time  to  a  general  rule,  a  rule 
thus  expressed: — "He  that  will  live  godly  in 
Christ  Jesus  shall  suffer  persecution."     Their 

*  Ockley,  p.  168.  f  Assemani,  p.  97. 


108  ISIIMAEL   AND    THE    CHURCH. 

preservation  therefore  under  the  caliphs,  made 
prominent  in  prophecy  and  in  history,  gains 
thus  the  distinctness  of  a  great  event;  is 
pointed  out  as  "  the  white  spot  in  the  hide  of 
the  black  camel,"  the  oasis  that  for  four  cen- 
turies continued  to  smile  amid  Mohammedan 
desolations;  and  is  beheld  in  the  retrospec- 
tions of  our  own  times  as  beautiful  and  me- 
morable. 

The  Nestorians,  it  is  quite  evident  also,  had, 
at  the  period  of  the  Turkish  conquests  in  Asia, 
fallen  from  their  first  love;  and  their  candle- 
stick, like  that  of  the  seven  churches,  could  not 
in  that  event  have  retained  its  place.  It  is 
quite  probable  also  that  Providence,  in  nume- 
rous eclective  processes,  had  already  drawn  the 
piety  of  declining  Nest'orianism  into  the  higher 
purity  of  the  Paulicians,  and  had  effected  its 
ultimate  exodus  through  the  Alps. 

With  the  decline  of  the  caliphs  the  emigra- 
tion of  the  godly  evidently  set  toward  the 
West.  The  connecting  link  between  the  East 
and  the  West  was  formed  by  the  Paulicians. 
Their  churches  were  spread  out  on  the  western 
confines  of  Nestorianism,  and  fringed  with 
light  the  eastern  borders  of  the  Greek  empire. 
It  will  break  the  chain  in  our  illustrations  to 
omit  a  brief  notice  of  this  sect. 


CHAPTER  XIV. 

MOHAMMED    PROTECTING  THE    TRUE   CHURCH: 
THE    PAULICIANS. 

"The  evil  that  men  do  lives  after  them; 
The  good  is  oft  interred  with  their  bones." 

A  deacon  returning  from  captivity  in  Syria, 
A.d.  660,  tarried  for  a  night  near  Samosata 
with  a  man  named  Constantine.  With  him  he 
left  a  copy  of  the  New  Testament,  It  to  him 
became  an  invaluable  treasure,  the  study  and 
the  rule  of  his  life;  his  house  and  his  heart 
the  place  of  its  sanctifying  influence.  The 
Paulicians,  thus  incidentally  originated,  suf- 
fered for  one  hundred  and  fifty  years  all  the 
rigours  of  a  most  violent  persecution. 

During  all  this  period  their  patience  failed 
not.  Under  the  decree  of  the  cruel  empress 
Theodora,  to  say  nothing  of  other  persecutions, 
the  army  of  their  martyrs  was  numbered,  by 
their  foes,  at  a  hundred  thousand.  The  bleed- 
ing remnant,  just  at  the  point  of  total  extermi- 
nation, fled  for  protection  to  the  Moham- 
medans.    Here  they  found  pity  and  shelter, 

10  109 


110  ISIIMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

liberty  to  build  a  city,  and  perfect  religious  tole- 
ration. And  here  also,  in  after-years,  sprang 
up  that  alliance  which  enabled  their  exaspe- 
rated and  valiant  sons  to  win  back  again  for  a 
season  their  country  and  to  make  inquest  for 
the  blood  of  their  injured  and  unresisting  sires. 
Unable  to  ruin  them,  on  account  of  their 
Saracenic  resources,  their  transportation  into 
the  different  countries  of  Europe  became  the 
settled  policy  of  the  emperors.  Separated  from 
their  Asiatic  friends,  their  conversion  might 
perhaps  be  possible;  or  their  burial  in  the 
silence  of  the  grave  the  easier  and  the  more  cer- 
tain alternative.  "  Under  the  Byzantine  stand- 
ards the  Paulicians  were  often  transported  to 

the  Greek  provinces  of  Italy  and  Sicily 

Their  opinions  were  silently  propagated  in 
Rome  and  in  the  kingdoms  beyond  the  Alps. 
....  It  was  in  the  country  of  the  Albigois,  in 
the  southern  provinces  of  France,  that  the  Pau- 
licians were  most  deeply  implanted In 

the  thirteenth  century,  the  visible  assemblies 
of  the  Paulicians  were  extirpated  by  fire  and 

sword A  confession  of  simple  worship 

and  blameless  manners  is  extorted  from  their 


*  Gibbon,  vol.  v.  pp.  397,  398. 


THE   PAULICIANS.  Ill 

Previously  to  his  conversion  the  father  of 
the  Paulicians  was  probably  a  Manichaean. 
This  would  lay  a  sufficient  foundation  for  the 
most  injurious  imputations, — for  charging  upon 
him  and  his  followers  the  worst  forms  of  the 
repudiated  error.  The  Manichseans  would  also 
often  be  confounded  with  his  followers  by  the 
persecutors,  who  would  care  but  little  by  what 
name  their  victims  were  designated,  so  that  it 
was  at  the  same  time  sufficiently  odious.  One 
or  two  instances  of  this  kind,  taken  up  and  art- 
fully managed  two  hundred  years  afterward, 
might  easily  be  made  to  pass,  among  hasty 
compilers,  for  "  the  voice  of  all  antiquity." 

Obloquy  is  Rome's  best  atonement  for  her 
murders, —  the  uniform  sequel  to  every  mas- 
sacre, the  vile  reservoir  in  which  her  drip- 
ping skirts  have  ever  been  washed  from  inno- 
cent blood.  It  is  indeed  difficult  to  defend 
those  whose  tongues  and  whose  manuscripts 
have  alike  been  dissolved  and  scattered  in  the 
ashes  of  the  stake;  but,  "as  they  cannot  plead 
for  themselves,  our  candid  criticism  will  mag- 
nify the  good  and  abate  or  suspect  the  evil 
that  is  reported  by  their  adversaries."* 

They  were  very  tenacious  of  denominational 


*  Gibbon,  vol.  v.  p.  385. 


112  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

life,  and  maintained  it  until  the  tenth  century, 
against  the  oppressions  of  force  and  the  seduc- 
tions of  flattery.  Both  were  employed  to  ex- 
terminate or  convert  them;  and  both,  during 
four  centuries,  though  aided  by  the  assiduities 
of  an  empire,  proved  unavailing.  At  the  end 
of  this  period,  having  been  transported,  they 
became  absorbed  among  the  churches  of  the 
Alps.  This  easy  transition  is  traceable  to  the 
identity  of  their  views  and  sympathies  with 
the  Albigenses.  The  same  people,  deriving 
their  origin  from  the  same  Word  and  Spirit, 
meet  in  this  instance,  and,  "like  kindred 
drops,  mingle  into  one."  Luther  startled 
Europe  when  he  endorsed  and  vindicated  the 
injured  Huss.  It  was  a  testimony,  however, 
demanded  at  the  time,  and  both  generous  and 
just.  His  own  wronged  motives  and  character 
have  stood  all  the  brighter  for  it.  The  Wal- 
denses,  the  Albigenses,  the  Nestorians,  the 
Paulicians,  are  now  also  being  reached,  and 
are  beginning  to  be  rescued  from  obloquy  and 
oblivion  with  their  later  brethren. 

The  churches  of  the  valleys,  with  which  the 
Paulicians  became  identified,  were  planted  by 
Paul,  as  current  tradition  affirms, — a  fact,  in- 
deed, often  admitted  in  substance  by  the  In- 
quisitors themselves.     Never   connected  with 


THE    PAULICIANS.  113 

the  church  of  Rome,  and  uniformly  protesting 
alike  against  its  errors  and  those  also  of  the 
Gnostics  and  Manichseans,  fraternization  with 
them  is  of  itself  a  sufficient  vindication  of  the 
Paulicians  from  the  scandals  of  Rome. 

In  and  after  the  tenth  century  —  the  period 
in  which  they  become  so  favourably  known  to 
us  —  the  stream  becomes  too  modern,  broad, 
and  majestic,  to  be  effectually  clouded  and 
soiled  by  Papal  hands.  Pure  and  noble,  say 
we,  must  have  been  the  fountains  that,  in  a 
remote  antiquity  and  in  desert  places,  began  to 
send  out  such  healing  and  refreshing  waters. 
Providence  is  opening  a  brighter  era  for  the 
memory  of  the  injured  martyrs.  The  voices 
of  the  present  are  mingled  already  with  those 
of  past  ages  in  most  gratifying  harmony.  Ex- 
treme intervals  of  time  and  space  are  becoming 
annihilated.  The  deep  beds  of  seas  and  rivers 
are  giving  up  their  secrets,  and  fountains  their 
chronicles.  The  vaults  of  unexplored  grottos 
and  the  halls  of  buried  cities  are  yet,  it  is  also 
believed,  to  break  the  painful  silence  of  cen- 
turies, and  to  make  still  more  illustrious  the 
unity  of  Zion's  testimony  and  the  purity  and 
patience  of  the  saints.  But,  in  any  event,  it 
is  quite  certain,  even  now,  that  the  Saracens, 

when  they  extended  over  the  Paulicians  their 

10* 


114  ISIDIAEL    AND   THE   CHURCH. 

effective  protectorate,  were  but  aiding  the  same 
church  in  Asia  on  which  heaven  has  so  sig- 
nally affixed  its  seal  in  Europe  and  America, 
and  which  it  was  commanded  them  that  they 
should  not  hurt. 

Thus  the  witnesses  did  not  break,  but  con- 
tinued, their  succession.  The  disappearance 
of  the  Paulicians  from  Asia  was  not  their  ex- 
tirpation, but  their  exodus.  The  candlestick 
was  not  destroyed ;  it  was  removed  from  the 
Euphrates  to  the  Rhone.  The  star  that  set 
in  the  mountains  of  Armenia  rose  to  adorn 
the  glaciers  of  the  Alps.  Out  of  the  East, 
now  finally  become  the  field  of  blood  and  the 
charnel-house  of  nations,  God  had  but  called 
his  Bride  to  hide  her  in  her  long-prepared 
citadel  of  rocks  in  the  West,  It  was  her  next 
retreat,  prior  to  her  last,  across  the  Atlantic. 
IshmaeVs  wild  and  bloody  defence  was  now  at 
length  to  be  exchanged  for  the  safer  defiles  of 
inaccessible  mountains. 

The  distinct  recognition  of  the  doctrine  of 
the  Trinity,  and  of  Jesus  as  God's  eternal  Son, 
possessed  of  equal  power  and  glory  with  the 
Father,  on  the  part  of  the  Nestorians  and  the 
Paulicians,  exposed  them  equally  with  all  others 
to  the  sword  of  the  Saracens ;  since  all  such  are 
indiscriminately  denounced  in  the  Koran,  and 


THE    PAULICIANS.  115 

alike  condemned  to  death,  to  tribute,  or  the 
flames.  The  preservation  of  these  Christians, 
therefore,  was  an  event  not  only  not  to  have 
been  anticipated,  but,  even  now  that  we  have  all 
the  facts  before  us,  is  to  be  accounted  for  with 
the  greatest  difficulty,  and  even  to  be  rejected 
as  a  fable,  were  it  not  attested  by  the  unbroken 
voice  of  antiquity. 

The  Pagans  and  Jews,  the  Latins  and 
Greeks,  experienced  the  rigour  of  Moham- 
medan rule  when  under  it,  and,  when  not, 
the  torment  of  perpetual  aggressions.  But 
these  Christians,  though  holding  the  dogma 
most  offensive  to  the  pseudo-prophet,  and  to 
falsify  and  overthrow  which  he  makes  war 
upon  the  world,  do  not  so  much  as  lose  their 
citizenship.  Yea,  even  while  their  very  contro- 
versies make  it  all  the  more  obvious  that  they 
exalt  Jesus  to  a  divine  Sonship,  and  worship 
him  as  the  equal  and  the  companion  of  the 
Father,  they  are  carefully  protected  and  their 
wrongs  avenged  on  their  adversaries  by  those 
who  are  by  their  principles  and  prejudices 
arrayed  against  them.  "  What  shall  we  then 
say  to  these  things,"  but  that  it  was  com- 
manded them  so  to  do  by  Mohammed,  because 
he  could  not  curse,  as  Balaam  could  not,  whom 
God  had  not  cursed  ? — that  the  command  was 


11 G  ISIIMAEL  AND   THE    CIIURCII. 

repeated  by  the  caliphs  in  every  subsequent 
age  of  their  rule,  because  God  had  ordained 
that  "the  people  should  dwell  alone,  and 
should  not  be  reckoned  among  the  nations"? 
The  utterances  of  prophecy  are  laws  of  provi- 
dence, that,  amid  all  possible  and  conflicting 
contingencies,  cannot  be  broken.  The  flood — 
the  tendency  of  which,  is  the  whole  world's 
destruction — bears  up  and  saves  the  ark. 


CHAPTER  XV. 

MOHAMMED   PROTECTING    THE    TRUE    CHURCH: 
THE    PHILADELPHIANS. 

"  He  shall  not  ....  shoot  an  arrow  there." 

Among  the  seven  churches  of  Asia,  Phila- 
delphia alone  received  the  distinct  promise  of 
being  kept  from  the  hour  of  temptation  that 
should  come  upon  all  the  world  to  try  them 
that  dwelt  upon  the  earth.  (Rev.  x.  3.)  Perse- 
cutions by  pagan  emperors  could  not  have  been 
intended,  it  is  thought,  since  these  had  already 
commenced.  John's  banishment  to  Patmos  be- 
longed to  such  forms  of  oppression;  and  he 
could  not  then  in  that  conjuncture  have  re- 
spected them  as  new,  peculiar,  and  as  yet  to 
come,  or  as  yet  to  startle  the  church  by  a 
sudden  invasion  and  to  seduce  and  destroy  her 
children. 

The  gradual  growth  of  error,  as  tares  spring 
up  imperceptibly  and  slowly  among  the  wheat, 
seems  not  either  to  suit  the  action  of  the  temp- 
tation which  is  to  come  upon  the  church  from 

117 


118       ISHMAEL  AND  THE  CHURCH. 

causes  external  to  herself,  or  to  be  sprung 
upon  it  suddenly,  as  a  snare  upon  the  unsus- 
pecting bird.  The  great  apostasy  of  the  Greeks 
and  Latins  did  not  come  upon  the  church;  it 
grew  up  in  it.  It  was  not  a  sudden  expansion 
of  a  snare,  but  the  gradual  development  of  the 
smallest  beginnings  of  evil.  That  apostasy 
continues  still.  It  has  not  yet  completed  the 
whole  circuit  of  its  prophetic  hour;  and  from  it 
Philadelphia  has  not  been  preserved,  as  it  must 
have  been  if  that  snare  had  been  intended. 
She  has  fallen  into  the  idolatry  and  supersti- 
tion of  the  Greek  church  quite  as  deeply  as 
any  of  her  sister  churches. 

No  universal  temptation  suddenly  brought 
upon  the  whole  world  from  a  source  wholly 
external  to  its  existing  institutions,  that  began 
to  be,  in  a  period  subsequent  to  the  banishment 
of  John,  answers  to  the  language  of  the  text 
like  that  of  the  rise  and  spread  of  the  Mo- 
hammedan delusion.  It  arose  from  a  source 
wholly  external  to  all  other  religions.  It  came 
suddenly,  like  a  snare,  upon  the  whole  world. 
In  six  years  after  the  first  invasion  of  Syria  by 
the  Saracens  the  whole  of  that  vast  and  popu- 
lous country  was  in  their  power.  Even  Asia 
Minor  was  reached,  and  Laodicea  succumbed  to 
the  false  prophet.    The  subsequent  subjugation 


THE    PIIILADELFIIIANS.  119 

of  Egypt,  Persia,  Bokhara,  and  Africa,  seemed 
but  the  brief  work  of  a  day.  As  nothing  can 
stop  the  progress  of  the  locust  but  Heaven's  own 
tempest  driving  them  back  into  the  sea,  so 
nothing  could  stop  the  progress  of  the  Saracens 
but  a  Divine  interposition.  They  were,  even 
at  the  point  of  defeat,  quite  irresistible. 

There  was  in  the  new  faith  also  a  snare,  a 
speciousness,  a  show  of  piety  and  of  religious 
zeal  or  sincerity,  that  made  it  and  its  pro- 
fessors compare  ycyv  favourably  with  the  reli- 
gion and  the  disciples  of  a  degenerate  Christen- 
dom. And,  when  social  ecjuality  with  the 
new  lords  of  the  civilized  world,  it  was  found, 
could  be  at  once  purchased  by  embracing  Is- 
lamism,  thousands  chose  this  alternative  and 
renounced  Christianity.  It  is  not,  therefore, 
without  strong  reasons  that  this  passage  has 
been  supposed  to  relate  to  this  temptation. 

The  spiritual  or  internal  history  of  the 
church  of  Philadelphia,  since  A.  d.  96,  lies 
shrouded  in  deep  obscurity.  It  was  and  still 
is  connected  with  the  Greek  church.  Its  dis- 
tance from  the  sea,  its  neglect  by  the  emperors, 
(noticed  by  Gibbon,)  must  have  been  favourable 
to  its  retention  of  primitive  simplicity  and 
purity.  Both  commerce  and  imperial  influence 
would,  in  the  fifth  century,  have  proved   ad- 


120  ISH1TAEL  AND    THE    CHURCH. 

verse  to  its  fidelity  to  Christ  in  a  very  high 
degree.  In  its  seclusion  it  may  have  retained 
for  a  season  its  integrity. 

And  equally  adverse  would  have  been  the 
capture  of  the  city  by  the  Saracens.  The  testa- 
ment of  Mohammed  granted  to  the  Nestorians 
would  not  have  sheltered  the  Christians  of 
Philadelphia,  since  they  belonged  to  the  com- 
munion of  the  Greek  church,  against  which 
the  Mohammedans  regarded  themselves  as 
having  had  committed  to  them  a  mission  of 
special  severity.  If,  in  the  event  of  their  sub- 
jugation, the  same  terms  had  been  presented 
to  the  Philadelphians  which  had  been  before 
to  other  communities,  the  church  must  have 
lost  its  Christianity  by  acceding  to  them,  or 
have  been  put  to  the  sword  if  they  refused. 
The  protection  of  the  city  from  the  Saracenic 
invaders  involves  in  it,  therefore,  the  protec- 
tion of  the  church  which  it  contained,  from  the 
temptation.  The  temptation  spread  its  snare 
over  the  conquered,  and  over  those  only.  To 
them  were  its  awful  alternatives  invariably 
submitted. 

The  promise  likewise  to  keep  the  church  of 
Philadelphia  "from  the  hour  of  temptation" 
was  based  upon  its  previous  fidelity  to  Christ, 
—  a   past  and  finished   virtue.      This  it  was 


THE    PHILADELPIIIANS.  121 

that  secured  the  reward.  Whatever  might 
have  been  the  possible  character  of  the  church 
in  after-years  or  during  the  period  designated 
in  the  benediction,  it  could  not  have  affected 
the  specific  result.  "Because  thou  hast  kept 
the  word  of  my  patience,  therefore  will  I 
keep  thee  from  the  hour  of  temptation  which 
shall  come/' — i.  e.  thy  past  fidelity  shall  secure 
the  future  blessing.  The  preservation  of 
the  city,  therefore,  from  the  Saracens  during 
the  continuance  of  the  prophetic  hour — viz. : 
during  the  whole  period  of  the  reign  of  the 
caliphs  —  would  be,  as  a  well-ascertained 
historic  fact,  a  remarkable  fulfilment  of  the 
promise,  even  though  we  might  suspect,  at 
the  same  time,  that  the  church  had  perhaps 
made  herself  quite  unworthy  of  the  divine 
favour,  or  had  lost  her  spiritual  life  long  be- 
fore the  first  woe,*  from  which  she  was  to 
have  been  kept,  according  to  the  promise,  had 
passed  away. 

Philadelphia  was  captured  by  the  Turks  in 
A.D.  1391,  630  years  after  the  first  woe  had 
become  merged  and  lost  in  the  second.f  Its 
name  was  changed  to  that  of  "  Allah  Shihr," — 
"city  of  God,"  or  "high  town."   In  1824  it  con- 

*  The  Empire  of  the  Caliphs.      f  The  Ottoman  Empire. 
11  H 


122  ISHMAEL  AND    THE    CHURCH. 

tained  three  thousand  houses.  Two  hundred 
and  fifty  of  these  belonged  to  Christians  of  the 
Greek  sect, — i.e.  to  nominal  Christians.  These 
point  out  the  church  in  which  the  believers 
were  accustomed  to  assemble  who  were  ad- 
dressed in  the  epistle  of  him  that  had  "the 
key  of  David."  It  is  now  a  mosque,  in  which 
God  is  denied  to  have  a  Holy  Spirit  or  a  Son. 
Another,  once  dedicated  to  St.  John,  is  turned 
into  a  dunghill  to  receive  the  offals  of  dead 
beasts.  Five  other  old  ruins  are  occupied  as 
places  of  worship.  Twenty  other  spots,  the 
sites  of  once  flourishing  churches,  are  covered 
with  their  abandoned  walls,  on  whose  crumb- 
ling stones  are  found  the  pictures  of  saints 
badly  painted  or  partially  defaced.  The  palace 
of  the  bishop  (such  it  is  sometimes  called)  is 
but  a  cottage  of  clay.  The  Turkish  conquest 
has  made  Philadelphia  a  comparative  solitude. 
Christianity  has  left  nothing  behind  her  here 
but  the  faintest  traces  of  her  departed  feet,  or 
the  moonlit  shadows  of  her  receding  form 
stealing  through  old  ruins  or  idolatrous  cere- 
monials and  sleeping  on  the  pale  faces  of  the 
dead.  Among  the  seven  cities  of  Asia,  Phila- 
delphia was  the  last  to  capitulate;  and  the 
articles  agreed  to,  secured  to  her  the  free  ex- 
ercise of  her  religion;  but  still  the  Turks  have 


THE    PIIILADELPIIIANS.  123 

sadly    disregarded    their    covenants    in    this 
respect. 

"  Among  the  Greek  colonies  and  churches 
of  Asia,  Philadelphia  is  still  erect, —  a  column 
in  a  scene  of  ruin,  a  pleasing  example  that 
the  paths  of  honour  and  of  safety  may  some- 
times be  the  same."*  This  is  a  beautiful 
picture ;  and,  from  the  frequency  with  which 
it  is  referred  to,  it  seems  to  have  been  for- 
gotten that  it  is  but  a  picture.  Philadelphia 
is  certainly  not  more  prosperous  than  its  sister 
cities, — is  not  "a  column  erect"  in  a  scene 
of  ruin.  It  does  not  stand  out  in  striking 
contrast  with  every  other  creation  of  genius 
or  of  industry  in  Ionia  or  Lydia.  It  is  itself 
a  ruin,  lifting  up  its  bare  and  desolate  head 
to  mourn  over  its  own  and  over  surrounding 
ruins.  A  few  pillars,  bearing  their  shafts  aloft, 
may  remind  the  traveller  of  the  promise, — "  I 
will  make  him  a  pillar;"  but  they  can  have  no 
real  or  intelligible  connection  with  the  pro- 
phecy. The  name  "city  of  God"  has  ap- 
peared to  some  very  suggestive,  because  it  was 
written  in  the  prophecy,  "  I  will  write  upon 
him  the  name  of  the  city  of  my  God,  which  is 
New  Jerusalem."     But,  unfortunately,  "New 


Gibbon  vol.  vi.  p. 


ooo 


124  ISHMAEL  AND   THE   CHURCH. 

Jerusalem"  is  not  the  name  of  Philadelphia. 
A  few  Greeks  living  in  Philadelphia,  calling 
themselves  Christians, — a  circumstance  com- 
mon in  many  other  Turkish  towns ; — a  few  mas- 
sive pillars  not  yet  prostrate  by  earthquakes ; — 
the  name  "city  of  God;" — and  the  rhetoric  of 
Gibbon  respecting  the  seven  churches  of  Asia, 
and  quoted  above, — constitute  the  staple  of 
those  materials  from  which  are  wrought  out,  I 
regret  to  say,  a  supposed  fulfilment  of  this  pro- 
phecy : — "  I  will  keep  thee  from  the  hour  of 
temptation."  And  yet  Philadelphia  is  even 
more  desolate  and  less  Christian  than  some 
other  of  the  seven  noted  cities  named  in  the 
Patmos  epistles.  Smyrna,  in  particular,  has  a 
population  of  130,000:— 20,000  Greeks,  8000 
Armenians,  1000  Europeans,  9000  Jews, — a 
population  in  the  aggregate  of  38,000  who  are 
not  Moslems,  of  whom  29,000  are  nominally 
Christian.  Philadelphia,  with  but  250  Greek 
families,  and  with  only  3000  houses  in  all, 
makes  but  a  sorry  appearance  in  the  contrast. 
It  would  seem,  therefore,  most  reasonable 
to  conclude  that  the  promise  to  Philadelphia 
has  already  long  ago  had  its  complete  ful- 
filment, and  that  under  the  first  woe.  The 
command  given  not  to  hurt  the  grass  of  the 
earth.,  neither  any  green  thing,  neither  any 


THE   PIIILADELPHIANS.  125 

tree,  but  only  those  men  that  have  not  the 
seal  of  God  in  their  foreheads,"  may  then  in 
this  view  of  the  subject  connect  itself  naturally 
enough  with  the  promise  to  the  church  of 
Philadelphia  that  she  should  be  kept  from 
that  hour  of  temptation  ;f  and  both  find  their 
sufficient  and  satisfactory  illustration  in  the 
finished  revolution  of  the  same  prophetic 
period,  or  in  the  single  empire  of  the  caliphs. 
The  Turks,  in  the  second  woe,  overthrowing 
Greece,  were  placed  under  no  such  restrictions 
as  were  the  Saracens.  They  were  sent  out  to 
kill;  and  they  have  ever  been  distinguishable 
from  the  Saracens  in  this  respect  more  than  in 
any  other.  They  have  never  discriminated 
between  the  sealed  and  those  who  were  not, 
The  first  woe,  therefore,  must  cover  the  epoch 
designated,  and  that  only.  It  was  a  world-wide 
snare;  had  its  origin,  progress,  and  end,  all 
within  itself;  and  of  it  it  is  said,  "  The  first 
woe  is  passed."  It  was  restricted  in  its  ravages. 
It  was  made  to  respect  the  interests  of  the 
sealed. 

While,  therefore,  the  first  and  the  second 
woes  are  connected,  we  should  not  forget 
that  they  are,  nevertheless,  distinct  from  each 


*  Rev.  ix.  4.  t  Kcv-  iii-  10- 

11* 


126  ISHMAEL    AND   THE    CHURCH. 

other  both  in  prophecy  and  in  history.  The 
second  originates  in  the  first,  revives  while 
it  tramples  it,  and  gives  to  it  an  aggra- 
vated form;  but  this  intimate  union  of  the 
two  woes  does  not  confound  them  with  each 
other.  They  are  still  to  be  kept  distinct  in 
our  conceptions  of  them,  as  they  are  in  the 
word  of  God.  And  in  that  event  the  whole 
obscurity  will  vanish,  and  the  promise  to  the 
church  of  Philadelphia,  that  "she  should  be 
kept  from  the  hour  of  temptation,"  and  the 
command  to  the  Saracens  "not  to  hurt  the 
sealed,"  coincide  as  prophecies  relating  to  the 
same  prophetic  period,  and  find  their  mutual 
illustrations  in  the  facts  of  history  and  during 
the  reign  of  the  caliphs: — a  fulfilment  this 
of  the  word  of  God  most  complete  in  itself, 
extending  through  a  vast  cycle  of  years  and 
events,  which  are  already  fully  consummated; 
a  fulfilment  that  needs  not  to  beg  for  illustra- 
tions at  the  lying  ruins  of  an  old  Turkish  town, 
or  garble  for  sustentation  at  the  rhetoric  of  an 
infidel* 

When  the  conquests  of  the  caliphs  had 
swept  up  to  the  confines  of  Asia  Minor  and 
t.hey  were  commencing  to  destroy  its  churches, 

*  Gibbon,  vol.  vi.  p.  229,  (Boston  edition.) 


THE    PIIILADELPIIIANS.  V27 

a  pestilence  arrested  their  farther  progress  in 
that  direction.  The  angel  of  death  guarded 
the  passes  to  the  favoured  city.  Horses,  cattle, 
25,000  soldiers,  and  their  ablest  officers,  perished 
without  hand.  The  tents  of  Syria  were  in 
affliction ;  the  curtains  of  the  land  of  Ishmael 
trembled.  That  year,  called  by  them  "the 
year  of  destruction,"*  put  back  their  sword 
into  its  sheath,  and  turned  their  camp  into  a 
hospital. 

Two  hundred  years  after  this,  Asia  Minor  is 
again  invaded,  Ephesus  taken,  and  its  lofty 
cathedral  turned  into  a  stable  for  mules  and 
horses ;  and  perhaps  it  was  from  the  influence 
of  the  Paulicians  over  their  Saracenic  allies 
that  the  battle  was  made  to  turn  at  this  time 
also  from  Philadelphia.-}* 

Their  rising  empire  spread  in  every  direction 
around  the  city,  around  the  confines  of  Lydia 
and  Ionia,  and  left  everywhere  the  deep  and 
bloody  traces  of  its  barbarism  and  the  deadly 
venom  of  its  faith.  But,  under  the  protecting 
care  and  love  of  Him  who  guarded  her  walls, 
Philadelphia  still  stood  secure.  Syria,  Egypt, 
Africa,    Spain,    Persia,    Bokhara,    Samarcand, 


*  Ockley's  Saracens,  p.  255,  (Bonn's  edition.) 
f  Gibbon,  vol.  v.  p.  393. 


128  ISHMAEL   AND    THE   CHURCH. 

became  conquered  provinces;  the  victorious 
Moslems  had  reached  alike  the  confines  of 
China  and  the  waves  of  the  Atlantic;  the 
Tiber  had  been  entered,  the  iEgean  Sea  had 
been  crossed,  Rome  and  Constantinople  shaken ; 
forty  thousand  churches,  cities,  and  castles, 
had  been  subverted,  had  opened  their  gates, 
had  lost  their  defences,  had  descended,  altar, 
crucifix,  and  battlement,  to  the  dust;  but  Phila- 
delphia still  survived, — surveyed  in  security, 
from  her  heaven-sealed  palaces,  the  wild  up- 
roar of  war,  the  ruin  of  surrounding  churches 
and  provinces,  the  tears  and  the  wreck  of  na- 
tions :  yea,  saw  in  peace  the  close  of  the  pro- 
phetic "  hour"  itself, — the  end  of  the  woe,  as  it 
sank  and  disappeared  in  the  sepulchre  of  the 
last  of  the  caliphs. 

How  she  stood,  while  every  town  and  fenced 
wall  and  strong  nationality  in  Asia  and  in 
Africa  went  down  under  the  rush  of  the 
Moslem  host,  remains  sealed  up  among  the 
mysteries  not  yet  unfolded.  The  barriers  of 
stone  and  the  "courage"*  of  her  sons  cannot 
be  assigned  as  the  causes  of  safety;  since  the 


*  Gibbon,  vol.  vi.  p.  229.  If,  instead  of  by  the  Turks, 
it  had  been  captured  by  the  Saracens,  this  sneer  at  the 
"  prophecy"  would  have  worn  a  graver  aspect. 


THE    PHILADELPHIANS.  129 

Saracens  never  appeared  before  Philadelphia 
at  all,  "to  cast  a  hank  against  it  or  shoot  an 
arrow  there."  Oh,  what  a  law  of  Providence 
is  that  word  of  promise  !  "  Because  thou  hast 
kept  the  word  of  my  patience,  I  also  will 
keep  thee  from  the  hour  of  temptation,  which 
shall  come  upon  all  the  world,  to  try  them  that 
dwell  upon  the  earth."  No  law  of  material 
nature  is  more  abiding.  "  He  speaks,  and  it  is 
done.     He  commands,  and  it  stands." 


CHAPTER  XVI. 

MOHAMMED    PROTECTING    TIIE    TRUE    CHURCH  : 
THE    ALBIGENSES. 

"  Their  fates  were  painted  ere  the  men  -were  born." 

Famine  ever  follows  on  the  track  of  war. 
The  Saracens  looked  from  the  Atlantic  coast 
over  conquered  but  exhausted  countries.  They 
were  impoverished  by  the  ruin  that  had 
blighted  the  creations  of  genius  and  the  fields 
of  the  reaper  along  their  own  broad  and  de- 
solate path.  Before  them  lay  a  vast  ocean ; 
behind  them  a  social  wilderness, — cities  broken 
down  and  without  walls  or  enterprise,  pro- 
vinces uncultivated  or  forsaken.  Europe  alone 
expanded  her  untouched  treasure  and  inflamed 
their  cupidity  and  their  courage.  The  narrow 
Straits  of  Gibraltar  presented  no  barrier  to 
their  resistless  progress.  An  Andalusian  king- 
dom was  soon  acquired  and  added  to  the  do- 
minions of  the  caliph. 

An  ocean,  breaking  at  their  feet,  had  turned 


THE   ALBIGENSIAN    CHURCH.  131 

back  the  Saracens ;  but  the  Pyrenees  and  the 
warlike  nations  of  the  frigid  North  invited 
their  squadrons  to  new  enterprises  of  war. 
France  is  also  invaded.  Her  fair  provinces 
are  oppressed  by  gathering  armies  and  horses 
running  to  battle.  The  sanctuary  of  the  sacra- 
mental host  is  now  on  a  sudden  thrown  open 
to  the  spoiler,  lies  in  the  immediate  vicinity 
of  the  doubtful  strife.  The  Rhone  alone  sepa- 
rates the  Albigenses  from  the  scimitar  and  the 
Koran.  And  here,  as  on  the  invaded  borders 
of  Asia  Minor,  the  conquerors  of  the  world  are 
again  arrested,  and  the  dismayed  remnant 
never  return  to  gather  the  spoil  or  bury  their 
dead. 

"After  a  bloody  field,  in  which  Abderame 
was  slain,  the  Saracens  in  the  close  of  the  even- 
ing retired  to  their  camp.  In  the  disorder  and 
despair  of  the  night  the  various  tribes  of  Yemen 
and  Damascus,  of  Africa  and  Spain,  were  pro- 
voked to  turn  their  arms  against  each  other;  the 
remains  of  their  host  were  suddenly  dissolved, 
and  each  emir  consulted  his  safety  by  a  hasty 
and  separate  retreat.  At  the  dawn  of  day  the 
stillness  of  a  hostile  camp  was  suspected  by 
the  victorious  Christians.  On  the  report  of 
their  spies  they  ventured  to  explore  the  riches 
of  the  vacant  tents The  Arabs   never 


132  ISHMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

resumed  the  conquest  of  Gaul ;  and  they  were 
soon  driven  beyond  the  Pyrenees. "* 

Ah  me !  but  for  this,  what  might  have  been 
the  result  on  the  ensuing  day !  On  the  issues  of 
its  bloody  debate  hung  the  fates  of  Europe,  the 
church,  and  the  world.  Ten  thousand  centres 
of  purity  and  progress  were  at  that  moment  in 
reach  of  the  scimitar, — might  have  been  oblite- 
rated forever.  The  last  hunted  remnant  of  a 
pure  Christianity  lay  exposed  and  helpless  in 
contiguous  valleys.  The  terrible  crisis  had 
come ;  and  now  either  Heaven  must  interpose 
and  destroy  the  destroyer,  or  leave  the  night 
of  an  Asiatic  barbarism  to  spread  itself  for 
unknown  ages  over  the  fair  provinces  of  West- 
ern civilization.  "  It  was  commanded  them 
that  they  should  not  hurt  the  grass  of  the 
earth,  neither  any  green  thing,  neither  any 
tree,  but  only  those  men  that  had  not  the  seal 
of  God  in  their  foreheads."  This  was  the  im- 
passable barrier  that  met  them  at  Philadelphia 
and  on  the  Khone,  and  contains  both  the  philo- 
sophy and  the  secret  of  the  successes  and  the 
failures  of  the  Saracens. 

The  new  wine  was  in  the  cluster  that  adorned 
the  vine  of  the  Alps;  and  Heaven  had  said, 

*  Gibbon,  ch.  52,  p.  290 


THE    ALBIGENSIAN    CHURCH.  133 

"Destroy  it  not,  for  a  blessing  is  in  it."  Paul, 
in  his  journey  to  Spain,  had  planted  in  these 
secluded  regions  a  church  that  had  never 
adhered  to  Kome.  Great  accessions  had  been 
made  to  its  numbers  when  the  remonstrants 
and  the  persecuted,  from  time  to  time,  retired 
from  the  open  idolatry  of  Christendom  into 
the  shelter  of  the  wilderness.  And  to  that 
fact,  and  not  to  her  want  of  guilt,  Europe 
owed  her  preservation.  Sodom  could  not  fall 
while  Lot  was  there,  nor  could  Jerusalem, 
until  the  righteous  had  made  good  their  escape 
to  the  mountains.  And,  as  God  had  chosen 
the  heart  of  Europe,  the  gorges  of  the  Alps, 
in  which  to  gather  and  cherish  his  spiritual 
family,  that  event  became  the  living  source 
of  security  to  the  West, — kept  the  Asiatic 
scourge,  like  lightning  on  the  skirts  of  a  cloud, 
to  expend  itself  on  the  borders  of  a  guilty 
land,  which  Heaven  would  not  destroy  because 
a  blessing  was  in  it. 
12 


CHAPTER  XVII. 

FOUNDING  OF  BAGDAD  THE  END  OF  THE 
PROPHETIC  MONTHS. 

"  Their  power  was  to  hurt  men  five  months." — Rev.  ix.  10. 

Mohammed,  according  to  Dean  Prideaux, 
was  born  at  Mecca,  in  the  month  of  May,  a.d. 
571.  Others  leave  the  point  undecided  be- 
tween a.d.  569  and  571.  When  he  was  forty 
years  of  age,  he  took  upon  him  the  style  of 
"  The  Apostle  of  God,"  and  began  to  propagate 
his  imposture.  In  one  hundred  and  fifty 
years  from  this  time  his  followers  ceased  from 
aggressive  wars  and  founded  the  "City  of 
Peace,"  or,  which  is  the  same  thing,  the  city 
of  Bagdad. 

From  that  period  (a.d.  762)  the  caliphs 
abandoned  the  coarse  habits  and  cultivated 
hardiness  of  warriors,  and  gave  themselves  up 
to  luxuries  that  rivalled  in  their  expensive 
magnificence  the  palmiest  displays  of  the 
Babylonian  or  Persian  princes.     Here,   amid 

131 


THE    PROPHETIC    MONTHS.  135 

gorgeous  palaces  and  in  the  embraces  of  the 
harem,  expired  forever  the  martial  glory  of 
the  Saracens. 

The  interval  between  a.d.  612  and  a.d.  762 
is  just  equal  to  John's  five  prophetic  months, 
or  one  hundred  and  fifty  days,  of  years.  If, 
however,  we  assume  the  correctness  of  either 
of  the  above  dates  assigned  as  the  time  of  the 
birth  of  Mohammed,  the  discrepancy  would  be 
too  inconsiderable  to  awaken  any  suspicion 
of  a  want  of  truth  in  the  prophecy,  since  mis- 
takes of  a  few  years  in  such  calculations  are 
but  too  common.  If  intelligent  individuals 
among  us  even  now  are  found  who  are  quite 
uncertain  as  to  the  time  of  their  own  births, 
notwithstanding  the  living  witnesses  and  the 
recency  of  the  chronological  era  to  be  fixed, 
we  ought  not  to  be  surprised  that  a  possible 
mistake  of  a  few  years  obscured  the  question 
relating  to  the  time  of  Mohammed's  birth, — 
a  fact  lying  back  more  than  twelve  centuries 
from  our  own  times,  in  an  obscure  spot,  in 
a  barbarous  age,  and  among  a  people  who 
reckoned  time  by  lunar  months  and  with  con- 
fessed inaccuracy. 

And,  as  John  was  guided  by  inspiration,  I 
assume  his  correctness,  and  from  this  source 
confirm  the  infallible  correctness  of  the  com- 


136  ISHMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

mon  reckoning.  In  assuming  the  absolute  cor- 
rectness of  any  other  date,  we  are  left  at  all 
uncertainties  in  the  mists  of  an  era  that  lies 
back  of  the  Hegira  itself,  and  in  the  very  chaos 
of  Arabian  chronology. 


CHAPTER   XVIII. 

THE    CONTRAST    BETWEEN   CHRIST  AND   MOHAMMED. 

To  make  them  from  restraint  and  conscience  free, 
Bad  as  thyself,  or  worse, — if  worse  can  be." 

The  wars  of  the  Saracens  were  prolonged 
through  a  period  of  one  hundred  and  fifty 
years,  with  but  partial  intermissions.  Their 
path  of  carnage  likewise  was  made  through 
the  most  densely-peopled  portions  of  the  globe. 
It  left  desolate  its  richest  cities  and  provinces. 
"  They  destroyed  wonderfully.  And  they  had 
a  king  over  them,  which  was  the  angel  of  the 
bottomless  pit,  wThose  name  in  the  Hebrew 
tongue  is  Abaddon,  but  in  the  Greek  tongue 
hath  his  name  Apollyon."* 

The  waste  of  human  life  must  have  been  im- 
mense. To  say  nothing  of  the  incalculable  losses 
in  beautiful  villas,  castles,  cities,  palaces, — to 
agriculture,  commerce,  and  literature, — the  loss 
of  life  in  battles  and  sieges,  and  the  loss  of  im- 


*  Rev.  ix.  11. 
12*  i  137 


138  ISHMAEL   AND    THE   CHURCH. 

mortal  men,  perishing  without  repentance,  or 
living  to  die  in  apostasy  from  Christ,  justifies 
the  designation  "Destroyer" — points  out  the 
true  character  of  the  woe,  and  of  the  manner 
in  which  the  Mohammedans  rose  to  power. 

All  along  the  line  of  their  march,  in  town 
and  country,  they  have  left  everywhere  their 
broad  trail  of  enduring  desolation.  Cities  sit 
solitary;  thronged  streets  are  become  a  portion 
for  foxes ;  the  raven's  noisy  croak  rises  from  for- 
saken balconies  and  from  the  area  of  palaces  and 
theatres.  The  brave  defenders  of  their  invaded 
country  sleep  where  they  fell,  amid  ruins  which 
have  never  been  restored.  Progressive  civiliza- 
tion, which  obliterates  elsewhere  the  ravages  of 
war  or  of  time,  disturbs  not  their  resting-places. 
The  mould  of  ages  covers  their  bones. 

The  angel  that  presided  at  the  incantations 
of  Hara  was  the  "destroyer."  He  aided  the 
inventiveness  of  his  dupe,  deceived  the  de- 
ceiver, instructed  his  revenge,  poured  venom 
on  his  bitter  communings  respecting  his  per- 
secutors at  Mecca,  whispered  in  his  attentive 
ear  of  the  sweetness  of  bloody  reprisals,  made 
him  respect  his  own  skill  and  courage,  and 
tilled  him  with  the  lust  of  success.  Animated 
with  pandemonial  zeal,  he  grasped  the  burning 
brand,  and  felt  it  to  be  instinctive  with  the 


CONTRAST CHRIST  AND  MOHAMMED.         139 

successes  of  his  diabolical  mission.  He  began, 
and  continued  till  he  died,  the  work  of  "de- 
struction." 

The  same  angel  also  that  inspired  the  fury 
of  the  prophet  inspired  the  courage  of  his 
lieutenants,  and  led  them  on  against  the 
church  in  their  mission  of  woe.  The  same 
untiring  malignity  that  led  Cain  to  murder 
his  brother,  that  led  Balaam  to  desire  to 
curse  whom  God  had  not  cursed,  that  led 
Herod  to  slay  the  babes  of  Bethlehem,  that 
conducted  the  trial  before,  Pilate,  and  that 
directed  the  tragedy  of  the  cross,  led  on  the  re- 
morseless bands  of  Arabia  upon  Christendom. 

The  result  sought  was  the  utter  undoing  of 
the  entire  church,  both  the  true  and  the  false; 
and  that  result  was  held  in  arrest  only  because 
the  reins  of  an  ultimate  restraint  had  been 
placed  in  the  hand  of  bleeding  mercy.  The 
same  mighty  Man-child  that  ever  confounded 
the  dark  policies  of  the  pit  was  he  who  pro- 
tected the  Nestorians,  the  Paulicians,  the  re- 
fugees of  the  monasteries,  his  loved  ones  in 
Philadelphia,  and  who  broke  up  and  scattered 
the  army  of  the  aliens  on  the  banks  of  the 
Rhone. 

The  failure  of  the  destroyer  was  the  failure 
of  a  bridled  rage,  of  a  hungry  tiger  that  had 


140  ISHMAEL  AND   THE   CHURCH. 

reached  the  end  of  his  chain  and  that  still 
roared  after  his  prey.  The  same  blessed 
Messiah  who  said  in  the  days  of  his  flesh, 
"Come  out  of  him,  thou  unclean  spirit/'  had 
also  said,  "Hurt  not  the  grass  of  the  field, 
neither  any  green  thing,  neither  any  tree,  but 
only  those  men  who  have  not  the  seal  of  God 
in  their  foreheads."  This,  and  this  only,  was 
it  that  bounded  and  controlled  the  rage  of  the 
destroyer.  But  for  this,  there  would  have 
been  no  limit  to  the  progress  of  the  woe. 

The  hand  that  opened  the  cave  of  Hara 
was  the  hand  of  him  "that  had  the  power  of 
death,"  unbarring  the  gates  of  perdition.  The 
spirit  that  presided  over  the  dusky  warriors 
that  rushed  up  from  the  recesses  of  the  desert 
was  that  of  "Abaddon"  The  field  of  his  con- 
quests was  that  world  which  the  cross  had 
turned  into  the  theatre  of  redemption.  That 
lost  world  he  would  retain  as  his  own,  and 
spread,  over  the  bosom  of  a  blighted  orb  and  a 
perished  humanity,  the  crimes  and  the  woes 
of  hell. 

Contrasts  there  are  between  Christ  and  Mo- 
hammed; but  they  are  all  too  intense.  They 
are  rather  the  contests  between  the  seed  of  the 
woman  and>  the  seed  of  the  serpent.  The 
object  aimed  at  on  the  part  of  the  adversary 


CONTRAST — CHRIST   AND   MOTIAMMED.      141 

is  the  ruin  of  Christ  and  of  his  kingdom  in 
this  world.  The  master-spirit  in  the  contest 
is  that  of  the  angel  of  the  bottomless  pit. 
When  first  created,  he  kept  not  his  first  estate 
or  principality,  but  left  his  own  habitation, 
then  assigned  him,  to  invade  that  of  others. 
Ours  was  invaded,  and  paradise  and  immortal- 
ity lost.  And  at  this  point  it  is  that  God 
interposes  and  puts  enmity  between  the  seed 
of  the  woman  and  the  seed  of  the  serpent. 

Not  that,  previously  to  this  period,  harmony 
had  existed  between  Christ  and  Belial;  but 
now,  while  the  world  should  stand,  they  should 
be  placed  in  the  relations  of  an  intimate  and  a 
necessary  antagonism.  Satan,  by  the  fall, 
rose,  in  accordance  with  the  decrees  of  eternal 
justice,  to  be  the  tormentor  of  his  dupes, — had 
given  to  him  "the  power  of  death."*  But, 
while  the  evil,  once  originated,  must  take  its 
course  according  to  determinate  and  immutable 
laws,  God,  without  changing  these,  originated 
a  new  and  an  independent  centre  of  life  in  a 
Redeemer,  who  should  in  the  fulness  of  the 
times  destroy  him  that  had  the  power  of 
death. 

Placed  thus  in  the  same  world,  there  opens, 

*Heb.ii. 


142  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

from  the  fall  to  the  last  shock  of  time,  the  con- 
flict of  ages.  And  this  it  is  that  we  are  to 
see  in  the  field  of  blood  over  which  waves  the 
red  right  hand  of  Ishmael.  It  is  Michael  and 
his  angels,  and  the  dragon  and  his  angels. 

But  even  between  such  antagonisms  there 
are  contrasts.  They  may  be  drawn,  just  as 
they  are  between  righteousness  and  unright- 
eousness, light  and  darkness,  good  and  evil. 
Commencing  at  Mecca  and  at  Bethlehem,  they 
meet  and  astonish  us  in  every  step  of  our 
way. 

The  words  of  war  and  slaughter  come  up 
from  the  cave  of  Hara ;  "  Peace  on  earth,  good- 
will toward  men"  are  the  utterances  that  reach 
the  ears  of  prostrate  and  adoring  shepherds 
in  Judea.  Mohammed  came  to  destroy  men's 
lives;  Jesus  came  not  to  destroy  men's  lives, 
but  to  save  them.  Mohammed  stands  with 
garments  rolled  in  blood,  waving  his  drip- 
ping scimitar  over  the  scattered  ranks  of 
death;  Jesus  went  about  doing  good.  His 
progress  was  ever  along  the  wards  of  a 
vast  hospital.  Sights  of  woe  ever  met  his 
weeping  eye,  and  words  of  comfort  ever  fell 
from  his  blessed  lips.  While  he  moved 
through  Judea,  there  was  "balm  in  Gilead; 
there  was  a  Physician  there."     When  the  eye 


CONTRAST CHRIST    AND   MOHAMMED.       143 

saw  him,  it  blessed  him;  when  the  ear  heard, 
it  bore  witness  to  him,  because  he  delivered 
the  poor  that  cried,  the  fatherless,  and  him 
that  had  none  to  help. 

Mohammed  was  guilty  of  a  wholesale  and 
remorseless  assassination  of  the  Jews.  "  Seven 
hundred  were  dragged  in  chains  to  the  market- 
places of  the  city.  They  descended  alive  into 
the  grave,  prepared  for  their  execution  and 
burial;  and  the  apostle  beheld  with  an  inflex- 
ible eye  the  slaughter  of  his  helpless  ene- 
mies."* But  when  Peter  drew  his  sword, 
Jesus  healed  the  wounded  Malchus  and  re- 
buked his  hasty  disciple.  Nor  was  this  the 
policy  of  weakness  or  the  resort  of  fear;  for 
twelve  legions  of  angels  hung  in  invisible 
squadrons  around  him  to  bathe  the  holy  moun- 
tains in  blood  for  him.  He  was  the  Prince  of 
peace. 

Mohammed  taught  the  duty  of  forgiveness 
and  harmony  among  his  followers,  but  never- 
theless devoted  all  the  rest  of  mankind  to 
tribute  or  the  sword.  Jesus  said,  "  Love  your 
,  ^emies;  bless  them  that  curse  you;  do  good 
to  them  that  hate  you,  and  pray  for  them 
that  scornfully  use  and  persecute  you."     And 

*  Gibbon,  vol.  v.  p.134. 


144  ISHMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

when,  abandoned  by  all,  he  hung  upon  the 
cross,  and  heard  the  insults  and  the  scoffs  of 
those  who  cast  vile  imputations  in  his  teeth, 
he  said,  "Father,  forgive  them;  for  they  know 
not  what  they  do."  The  very  wretch  that 
pierced  his  side  but  opened  the  fountains  of 
his  own  salvation ;  and  in  that  very  city  which 
wronged  and  slew  him, — whose  blood-steeped 
pavements  cried  loudest  to  the  frowning  hea- 
vens for  retribution, — in  that  very  city  was 
the  apostolic  commission  first  opened,  were  the 
propositions  of  pardon  first  made.  The  army 
likewise  which  rose  and  spread  his  empire  had 
their  feet  shod  with  the  preparation  of  the 
gospel  of  peace.  The  sword  they  wielded  was 
the  sword  of  the  Spirit;  and  friends  and  foes 
were  alike  pointed  to  the  bleeding  cross  as 
prisoners  of  hope. 

It  is  quite  too  revolting — quite  beyond  the 
pale  of  even  a  tolerable  delicacy — to  take  up 
the  question  of  comparative  moral  purity. 

When  we  pass  from  the  divine  presence  of 
him  who  was  holy,  harmless,  undefiled,  and 
separate  from  sinners,  and  begin  with  that 
satyr  of  the  desert,  that  unclean  beast  in 
married  life,  who  justified  himself  in  pro- 
miscuous intercourse  by  pleading  a  dispensa- 
tion,— when  we  attempt  to  touch,  even  in  this 


CONTRAST — CHRIST  AND  MOHAMMED.         145 

respect,  that  indelible  blot  on  the  cheek  of 
humanity, — the  touch  itself  is  pollution.  It  is 
a  shame  even  to  speak  of  those  things,  in  any 
minuteness  of  detail,  which  were  done  by  the 
prophet  of  Mecca. 

And,  as  to  truth,  it  was  foreign  to  the  daily 
utterances  of  the  hardened  impostor.  To  talk 
of  his  probable  sincerity  may  suit  the  senti- 
mentalist, or  the  infidel  in  want  of  a  reason; 
but  it  is  difficult  for  the  candid  to  be  in  such 
a  milky  humour  respecting  one  whose  very 
successes  depended  on  successful  falsehood, 
hypocris}',  and  the  sword. 

The  signs  and  wonders  attesting  the  verity 
of  our  Lord's  blessed  mission  are  sought  for  in 
vain  in  the  history  of  the  Arabian  prophet. 
The  bed  of  lust  and  the  blood  of  murder  alone 
speak  for  him,  and  point  him  out  as  the  enemy 
of  Christ  and  of  man.  Contrasts  there  are  in- 
deed; but  they  are  contrasts  of  things  that 
differ  in  nature,  and  are  in  necessary  and  end- 
less opposition. 

The  power  and  permanency  of  evil  may  be 
traced  by  the  historian  and  the  philosopher  to 
the  deep  impressions  made  by  one  mind  of 
singular  strength  on  kindred  tribes  and  on 
successive  generations ;  but  the  instructed  dis- 
ciple in  accounting  for  the  phenomena  must 

18 


146  ISHMAEL   AND    THE    CHURCH. 

look  behind  the  veil  to  a  more  potent  indi- 
viduality, ever  active  in  its  untiring  malignity, 
which  reproduces  in  a  successor  the  wasted 
energies  of  the  fallen  prophet  and  perpetuates 
the  woe.  And  it  was  for  this  purpose — that  we 
might  not  lose,  in  the  detail  of  visible  agencies, 
the  vision  of  the  one  ever-active  master-spirit 
that  stamps  its  own  dark  features  on  Islamism 
from  generation  to  generation — that  it  is  said, 
in  concluding  the  delineation,  "And  they  had 
a  king  over  them,  which  was  the  angel  of  the 
bottomless  pit." 

One  of  the  twelve  disciples  rises  from  the 
table  of  the  Lord,  goes  out  and  betrays  his 
Master.  We  look  at  causes  as  they  appear  to 
us.  He  is  exposed  by  our  Lord's  reference  to 
his  dipping  in  the  dish.  The  eyes  of  all  turn 
on  him,  and  he  is  offended.  He  had  thought 
of  the  profits  of  treason  before,  but  now  he  is 
enraged  and  resolved;  and  why?  The  ulti- 
mate determination  of  his  will  is  traceable 
to  an  invisible  agency:  "Satan  entered  into 
him." 

Ananias  sold  his  lands  and  kept  back  part 
of  the  price.  His  vanity  was  clamorous  for 
the  reputation  of  liberality,  and  his  covetous- 
ness  for  the  possession  of  his  golden  treasures. 
To  cater  to  the  gratification  of  both  the  one 


CONTRAST CHRIST   AND   MOHAMMED.       147 

and  the  other  required  the  utterance  of  a  lie  to 
the  Holy  Ghost.  Such  are  the  outward  phe- 
nomena :  but  the  true  cause  was  invisible ;  and, 
in  an  account  that  should  comprehend  all  the 
facts  in  the  history  of  the  crime  of  Ananias, 
that  invisible  cause  must  be  made  prominent : 
— "  Why  hath  Satan  filled  thy  heart  to  lie  unto 
the  Holy  Ghost?" 

In  like  manner  also,  in  the  history  of  all 
evil  in  those  who  deliberately  enter  upon  a 
course  of  opposition  to  Christ  and  to  his  king- 
dom, there  is  the  same  account  to  be  given 
of  the  secret  cause  which  determined  the  will 
and  instigated  the  iniquity.  Satan  enters  into 
the  erring  soul,  fills  the  false  heart.  And, 
indeed,  all  evil  men,  respected  as  individuals 
or  as  communities,  when  at  war  with  Christ 
and  his  church,  "  have  a  king  over  them,  which 
is  the  angel  of  the  bottomless  pit." 


CHAPTER  XIX. 

THE    SARACENIC  MERGED   IN    THE   OTTOMAN 
EMPIRE. 

"  In  the  small  compass  of  a  grave, 
In  endless  night  they  sleep,  unwept,  unknown : 
No  bard  had  they  to  make  all  time  their  own." 

Byron. 
"  One  woe  is  past." — Rev.  ix.  12. 

The  sudden  and  vast  expansion  of  the  em- 
pire of  the  caliphs  was  the  wind  in  its  sails  that 
dashed  it  on  the  rocks.  It  resulted  in  destruc- 
tive domestic  wars  and  in  the  erection  of  sepa- 
rate and  powerful  states. 

Spain,  Mauritania,  Africa,  and  Egypt,  were 
severed  by  distance,  interest,  and  the  sword, 
from  their  Oriental  masters.  Arabia  also,  too 
remote  and  sparsely  peopled  to  form  an  influ- 
ential and  a  continued  centre  for  a  great  mon- 
archy, the  resort  of  fierce  and  impracticable 
fanatics,  the  theatre  of  strifes,  of  assassina- 
tions, and  stained  often  with  patrician  blood, 
was  finally  abandoned  from  necessity  rather 
than  policy. 

148 


THE   OTTOMAN   EMPIRE.  149 

A  new  and  splendid  city,  founded  by  Alman- 
zor,  rose  as  by  enchantment  on  the  eastern 
bank  of  the  Tigris,  and  near  its  confluence 
with  the  Euphrates.  To  it  was  transferred  the 
throne  and  palace,  the  staff  of  the  Apostle  of 
God,  and  the  other  ensigns  of  civil  and  of 
sacred  authority.  And,  though  the  rival  mon- 
archies of  the  West  held  for  ages  a  position  of 
grandeur  almost  equal  to  that  of  the  Abassides, 
yet,  when  the  shepherd-kings  rose  to  supre- 
macy in  Bagdad,  they  brought  back  again  to 
the  ancient  site  of  the  long-Mien  Babylon  the 
balance  of  power  and  the  revived  "  beauty  of 
the  Chaldees'  excellency." 

Hence,  in  designating  the  change,  and  the 
continuation  at  the  same  time  of  the  same 
power,  the  Euphrates,  and  the  innumerable 
armies  of  horsemen  that  on  a  sudden  rushed 
from  its  confines,  are  made  the  striking  em- 
blems of  the  second  woe. 

The  smoke,  issuing  from  a  pit,  suited  the 
locality  of  Mecca,  sunk  as  it  was  in  a  gulf 
formed  by  sharp  and  naked  mountains,  under 
torrid  suns,  and  surrounded  by  burning  sands. 
And  when  the  martial  zeal  of  the  Saracenic 
empire  revived  again  in  its  original  prestige 
on  the  banks  of  the  Euphrates,  and,  issuing 
from  thence,  reproduced  the  first  woe  through- 

13* 


150  ISHMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

out  the  southern  hemisphere  in  more  than  its 
original  bitterness,  finishing  a  ruin  that  had 
been  but  begun,  and  completely  subverting  the 
throne  of  the  Caesars,  it  becomes  quite  natural, 
in  a  continued  symbolic  delineation,  to  speak 
of  it  as  the  second  woe,  and  as  issuing  from  the 
celebrated  river  on  the  banks  of  which  it  un- 
expectedly culminates  and  becomes  again  the 
scourge  and  terror  of  the  world. 

The  Nestorian  patriarch  residing  at  Meru, 
on  the  southwestern  slopes  of  those  vast 
steppes  that  ascend  toward  the  confines  of 
China,  had  observed  the  progress  of  a  race  of 
Scythian  shepherds  toward  the  wide  savan- 
nahs of  Transoxiana  and  Carisme.  This  fact 
he  at  length  communicated  to  the  patri- 
arch at  Bagdad,  intimating  that  they  were 
hastening  to  change  the  face  of  Asia  and  the 
fortunes  of  the  world.  Repairing  to  the  coun- 
cil-chamber of  the  caliphs,  the  letter  was  read 
to  the  astonished  chiefs. 

It  stated  that  "a  people  numerous  as  the 
locust-cloud  had  burst  from  the  mountains 
between  Thibet  and  Katan,  and  were  pouring 
down  upon  the  fertile  plains  of  Kashgar. 
They  were  commanded  by  seven  kings,  each 
at  the  head  of  seventy  thousand  horsemen. 
The   warriors   were   as   swarthy   as    Indians. 


THE   OTTOMAN   EMPIRE.  151 

They  used  no  water  in  their  ablutions,  nor 
did  they  cut  their  hair.  They  were  most 
skilful  archers,  and  were  content  with  simple 
and  frugal  fare.  Their  horses  were  fed  upon 
meat."* 

Such  were  the  first  intimations  of  approach- 
ing change.  It,  however,  fell  upon  the  ears 
of  a  degenerate  race,  who,  though  descended 
from  the  mighty  conquerors  of  Syria,  had  en- 
tombed the  hardness  and  daring  of  the  earlier 
caliphs  in  the  magnificent  harems  of  Bagdad. 

Extremes  meet  in  their  history.  "  Moham- 
med used  at  first,  when  preaching  in  his 
mosque  at  Medina,  to  lean  upon  a  post  of  a 
palm-tree  driven  into  the  ground;  but,  being 
now  invested  with  greater  dignity,  he  had  a 
pulpit  built  which  had  two  steps  up  to  it  and 
a  seat  within.  When  Othman  was  caliph  he 
hung  it  with  tapestry,  and  Moawiyah  raised  it 
six  steps  higher."f 

Omar  the  caliph,  in  his  journey  to  Jerusa- 
lem, "  rode  upon  a  red  camel  with  a  couple  of 
sacks,  in  one  of  which  he  carried  that  sort  of 
provision  which  the  Arabs  call  t  sawik,'  which 
is   either  barley,  rice,  or  wheat,  sodden  and 

*  "  Nineveh  and  its  Remains/'  chap.  viii. 
|  Ockley,  p.  46. 


152  ISHMAEL  AND   THE   CHURCH. 

unhuskecl ;  the  other  was  full  of  fruits.  Be- 
fore him  he  carried  a  very  great  leathern 
bottle,  (very  necessary  in  those  desert  coun- 
tries to  put  water  in;)  behind  him  a  large 
wooden  platter.  When  encamped,  he  sat  on 
the  ground  to  eat.  Then,  filling  his  platter 
with  the  sawik,  he  very  liberally  entertained 
his  fellow-travellers,  who,  without  distinction, 
ate  with  him,  all  out  of  the  same  dish."* 

"  Having  met  with  some  of  the  Saracens, 
richly  dressed  in  silks  that  they  had  taken  by 
way  of  plunder  after  the  battle  of  Yarmuk, 
he  spoiled  all  their  pride ;  for  he  caused  them 
to  be  dragged  along  in  the  dirt  with  their 
faces  downward,  and  their  clothes  to  be  rent 
in  pieces."f 

But  when  success  had  crowned  their  arms, 
and  for  three  centuries  they  had  had  the  lord- 
ship of  the  southern  hemisphere, — an  empire  in 
which  the  sun  rose  and  set, — the  contrast  with 
the  simplicity  of  earlier  times  became  intense. 

"When  the  Greek  ambassador  visited  the 
court  of  Bagdad,  the  caliph's  whole  army," 
says  the  historian  Abulfeda,  "  both  horse  and 
foot,  was  under  arms,  which  together  made  a 
body  of  one  hundred  and  sixty  thousand  men. 


Ockley,  p.  208.  f  Ibid-  P-  211- 


THE  OTTOMAN   EMPIRE.  153 

His  state-officers — the  favourite  slaves — stood 
near  him  in  splendid  apparel,  their  belts  glit- 
tering with  gold  and  gems.  Near  them  were 
seven  thousand  eunuchs,  four  thousand  of  them 
white,  the  remainder  black.  The  porters  (or 
door-keepers)  were  in  number  seven  hundred. 
Barges  and  boats,  with  the  most  superb  decora- 
tions, were  seen  swimming  upon  the  Tigris. 

"  Nor  was  the  palace  itself  less  splendid,  in 
which  were  hung  up  thirty-eight  thousand 
pieces  of  tapestry,  twelve  thousand  five  hun- 
dred of  which  were  of  silk,  embroidered  with 
gold.  The  carpets  on  the  floor  were  twenty-two 
thousand.  One  hundred  lions  were  brought 
out,  with  a  keeper  to  each  lion. 

"  Among  the  other  spectacles  of  rare  and 
splendid  luxury  was  a  tree  of  gold  and  silver, 
spreading  into  eighteen  large  branches,  on 
which,  and  on  the  lesser  boughs,  sat  a  variety 
of  birds  made  of  the  same  precious  metals, 
as  well  as  the  limbs  of  the  tree.  While  the 
machinery  effected  spontaneous  motions,  the 
several  birds  warbled  their  natural  harmony. 
Through  this  scene  of  magnificence  the  Greek 
ambassador  was  led  by  the  vizier  to  the  foot 
of  the  caliph's  throne."* 

*  Gibbon,  vol.  v.  p.  298. 
K 


154  ISHMAEL  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

Such  splendour,  however,  was  but  the  final 
blaze  of  an  expiring  greatness,  to  go  out  all 
the  sooner  for  its  unnatural  brightness.  The 
very  menials  that  composed  the  trains  of 
servants,  and  the  very  soldiers  that  filled  the 
ranks  of  the  army,  defended  the  city,  and 
upheld  a  decrepit  dynasty,  were  foreigners, 
who  learned  to  despise  their  effeminate  em- 
ployers and  the  confessed  imbecility  which  re- 
quired their  aid.  The  transition  from  idolatry 
to  Mohammedanism  is  easy.  They  embraced 
the  short  creed  of  the  prophet  with  sincerity, 
and  thus,  though  of  a  different  origin,  amalga- 
mated their  nationality  with  that  of  their 
recent  masters. 

Having,  after  a  signal  victory,  founded  the 
dynasty  of  the  shepherd-kings  in  Persia, 
Togrul  Beg,  their  rude  and  successful  chief, 
aspired  to  the  throne  and  sceptre  to  the  de- 
fence of  which  he  had  been  called  amid  the 
domestic  and  bloody  factions  of  Bagdad. 

Marrying  the  daughter  of  the  caliph  whom 
his  sword  supported,  he  died  A.d.  1063,  leav- 
ing no  issue.  Alp  Arslan,  his  nephew,  suc- 
ceeded to  his  title  as  sultan;  and  from  this 
period  "his  name,  after  that  of  the  caliph,  was 
pronounced  in  the  public  prayers  of  the  Mos- 


THE   OTTOMAN  EMPIRE.  155 

lems."*  The  union  and  the  revolution  was 
now  complete,  and  the  Turkish  sultany  had 
succeeded  in  every  respect  to  the  caliphate. 

The  prophetic  interval  of  three  hundred 
and  ninety-one  years  lies  between  this  period 
and  A.d.  1453,  during  which  the  four  angels 
remained  bound  in  the  great  river,  and  pre- 
pared, whenever  they  should  be  summoned,  to 
rush  forth  and  slay  "the  third  part  of  men."f 

The  first  third  fell  before  the  Goths  and 
Vandals;  the  second  before  the  caliphs;  the 
third  was  now  destined  to  fall  before  the  Otto- 
mans. Such  is  the  origin  of  the  Turkish 
empire;  and  thus  are  connected  the  first  and 
the  second  woes. 

The  sword  of  the  dying  Mohammed  was 
effectually  wielded  by  his  lieutenants.  It 
became  the  symbol  of  his  faith  and  the  instru- 
ment of  its  success.  When  his  followers  threw 
it  aside  for  the  trowel,  the  plough,  the  lancet, 
studied  the  instructions  of  wisdom  and  sought 
the  embraces  of  pleasure,  the  empire,  like  its 
founder,  lost  its  vitality  and  sunk  into  the  tomb. 

Just  at  this  point  it  is,  also,  that  its  resusci- 
tation commences.  The  Scythian  shepherds 
rise  to  the  dominion,  and,  while  they  trample 

*  Gibbon,  vol.  v.  p.  511.  f  Rev- ix>  15' 


156  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

its  ashes,  warm  into  unexpected  life  the  cur- 
rent of  its  blood.  The  two  races  mingle  into 
one,  in  the  principles  of  their  faith,  in  their 
intermarriages  with  each  other;  and  the  long- 
spent  fury  of  Ishmael  revives  again  in  the 
children  of  the  East. 

The  empire  of  the  shepherds  remained  a 
unit,  swayed  by  a  single  mind,  until  the  death 
of  Malek  Shah,  when  the  succession  was  dis- 
puted in  bloody  debates  by  his  brother  and 
his  four  sons.  These  ended  in  the  erection  of 
the  four  sultanies, — viz. :  Persia,  Koum,  Syria? 
and  Kerman.  These  are  the  noted  ministers 
of  divine  and  long-restrained  vengeance, — the 
four  angels  of  the  great  river  on  whose  banks 
they  rise  to  power  and  from  whence  they 
spread  their  conquests. 

The  prophet  speaks  of  them  as  the  four 
angels  of  the  river,  since  it  was  during  their 
fourfold  division  that  the  binding  processes,  in 
the  wars  of  the  cross,  commenced. 

It  seems  also  quite  appropriate  to  retain  this 
designation  even  after  these  divisions  termi- 
nated, or  to  give  the  title  to  the  main  division 
or  branch  of  the  four,  when  it  finally  absorbs 
the  strength  of  the  other  branches  and  becomes 
the  prominent  instrument  in  executing  the 
decrees   of  Providence.      As   they   had   been 


THE   OTTOMAN   EMPIRE.  157 

bound  when  existing  as  the  four  sultanies,  so 
the  loosing  of  them  would  suggest  that  the 
restraint  was  taken  off  from  them  all  alike 
and  at  the  same  time;  which  was  the  fact 
when  their  common  foes,  the  Crusaders,  had 
finally  left  the  battle-fields  of  Asia. 

The  preparation  also  "to  slay  the  third  part 
of  men"  belonged  alike  to  all  the  sultanies; 
since  during  the  period  of  the  preparation  to 
the  time  in  which  they  were  loosed  to  slay, 
they  were  a  mutual  aid  to  each  other,  and 
during  the  oppressions  of  the  Crusades  their 
combined  power  was  needed  for  mutual  pre- 
servation from  extinction. 

It  does  not  hence  seem  of  much  force  to 
urge  inasmuch  as  the  Turkish  branch  of 
the  great  monarchy  of  the  Euphrates  mainly 
effected  the  overthrow  of  Greece,  that  there- 
fore the  other  branches  could  not  have  been 
included  in  the  processes  of  the  long-continued 
preparation. 

It  is  quite  obvious,  on  the  contrary,  that  the 
four  sultanies  mutually  sustained  each  other 
amid  the  wars  that  threatened  their  total  ruin 
as  separate  or  as  confederate  states;  and  hence 
the  processes  of  the  preparation,  the  binding 
and  the  loosing,  belong  alike  to  the  four,  and  it 
is  proper  and  natural  so  to  speak  of  them. 

14 


CHAPTER  XX. 

THE  CRUSADES — THEIR  CAUSES  AND  ENDS. 

"Hail,  Calvary,  thou  mountain  hoar, 
Wet  with  our  Redeemer's  gore  ! 
Ye  trampled  tombs,  ye  fanes  forlorn, 
Ye  stones  by  tears  of  pilgrims  'worn ! 
Your  ravish'd  honours  to  restore, 
Fearless  we  climb  this  hostile  shore !" 

Warton. 

The  Turks,  in  the  zeal  of  recent  converts 
and  in  the  cruelty  of  slaves  just  risen  to  be 
masters,  exceeded  the  Saracens  in  intolerance 
and  oppression,  demanded  of  the  pilgrims  in 
the  holy  city  impossible  sums,  dragged  their 
patriarch  by  the  hair  of  his  head  on  the  pave- 
ment, and  turned  the  plains  of  Asia  into 
a  highway  for  their  robber-bands.  Princes, 
nobles,  the  ministers  of  religion  and  trains  of 
unarmed  peasants,  on  their  way  to  the  holy 
sepulchre,  were  alike  pillaged,  beaten,  slain, 
and  sometimes  their  stomachs  ripped  open  and 
examined  for  treasures  supposed  to  have  been 
swallowed. 

There  was  in  the  Turkish  accession  to  Mo- 

158 


THE   CRUSADES.  159 

hammedanism  a  revival  of  the  zeal  and  cru- 
elty of  the  tiger  Caled,  and  of  those  that  fol- 
lowed him  in  "  the  paths  of  blood."  The  time 
however  for  their  peculiar  mission  had  not 
yet  arrived.  They  were  anticipating  it  by 
centuries.  They  must  therefore  back  again  to 
their  enclosures,  lose  Palestine  and  Peninsular 
Asia,  and  struggle  in  vain  to  burst  their  bonds 
or  break  from  the  frail  barriers  of  the  Eu- 
phrates, until  the  time  appointed. 

In  God's  providential  government  of  the 
world,  his  care  for  his  church  is  ever  a  con- 
trolling consideration. 

When  her  safety  is  endangered,  the  caverns 
and  gorges  of  the  Alps  become  the  hollow  of  his 
hand  in  which  he  hides  her.  His  seal  is  placed 
upon  the  forehead  of  his  people,  and  his  pro- 
tective shield  hangs  at  the  gate  of  the  monas- 
tery as  soon  as  they  enter  there.  An  invisible 
rampart  surrounds  Philadelphia,  because  she 
shelters  those  who  kept  the  word  of  his  pa- 
tience. His  people  are  in  the  valleys,  and  a 
vast  army  falls  without  hand,  and  flies  in 
hopeless  disarray  from  the  banks  of  the  Rhone. 

And  to  that  same  tender  care  of  his  church, 
so  obvious  in  the  past  and  so  cheering  in  our 
anticipations  of  the  future,  are  we  to  look  for 
the  causes  of  the  Crusades. 


160  ISHMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

The  voice  of  Peter  the  Hermit,  summoning 
the  fierce  chivalry  of  the  North  to  the  rescue 
of  the  holy  sepulchre,  was  the  voice  of  God, 
commanding  those  who  would  have  heen  sure 
to  have  arrested  his  gracious  work  in  blood  to 
a  distant  land,  to  gratify  there  their  love  of 
war,  to  expend  there  their  martial  rage  on  the 
turbulent  sultanies,  and  finally  to  disappear 
there  themselves,  and  bury  their  hosts  forever 
in  the  oblivion  of  the  desert. 

There  is  a  choice  in  approaching  or  liable 
evils,  and  in  the  selection  from  among  which 
of  one  rather  than  another  a  providential  in- 
telligence discovers  its  wisdom. 

An  apostate  is  also  often  a  persecuting  church, 
the  implacable  foe  of  Zion.  But,  evil  and  de- 
structive though  it  be,  yet  there  are  occasional 
mitigations,  periods  of  intervening  repose,  and 
here  and  there  a  ray  of  a  pure  and  sanctifying 
light.  But  a  false  system  of  faith,  such  as  that 
of  the  Arabian  prophet,  is  a  ruin  that  leaves 
behind  it  no  trace  of  that  Christianity  which 
it  wholly  exterminates. 

Catholic  Europe,  as  compared  with  Britain 
and  the  United  States,  is  one  among  the  dark 
places  of  the  earth ;  still,  an  intenser  darkness 
broods  over  Mohammedan  countries. 

To  bind  these  angels,  therefore,  within  the 


THE  CRUSADES.  1G1 

limits  of  their  original  dominions,  was  the 
will  and  the  work  of  a  protective  Providence. 
God  waits  not  till  the  myriads  of  the  Turkish 
horse  slake  their  thirst  in  the  rivers  and  foun- 
tains of  the  Alps,  ere  he  rouses  to  the  defence 
of  his  bride  in  the  wilderness.  He  anticipates 
and  turns  away  the  threatened  ruin  by  turn- 
ing the  tide  of  battle  to  the  East. 

This  event,  then,  is  invested  with  a  peculiar 
interest  not  only  in  itself,  as  it  is  a  history  of 
remarkable  occurrences,  but  also  with  a  rela- 
tive interest,  as  it  is  the  next  step  in  the  series 
of  those  processes  by  which  the  church  is  pre- 
served from  extermination,  and  by  means  of 
which  she  is  enabled  to  spread  through  Europe 
the  imperishable  elements  of  the  great  Kefor- 
mation. 

In  a.d.  1095  Peter  the  Hermit  visited  Je- 
rusalem, and  saw  and  felt  the  brutal  violence 
of  the  Turks  with  emotions  of  unutterable 
horror.  The  patriarch  also  recounted  the 
trials  of  cruel  mockings  and  scourgings,  of 
bonds  and  exactions,  to  which  his  suffering 
flock  had  been  subjected  under  the  new  regime. 
He  witnessed  also,  with  his  own  eyes,  the  tomb 
of  Jesus  defaced,  the  church  of  the  resurrection 
violated,  and  the  pilgrims  perishing  in  want 
and  misery  around  him. 

14* 


162  ISnMAEL   AND   THE  CHURCH. 

Convinced  that  expostulation  would  but 
tempt  to  heavier  oppressions,  and  that,  if  Eu- 
rope would  preserve  the  poor  remains  of  an 
expiring  Christianity  from  being  entombed, 
amid  the  holiest  memorials  of  her  triumphs, 
in  the  very  church  of  the  resurrection,  in  the 
very  sepulchre  of  Messias,  she  must  do  it 
with  the  sword,  he  resolved  to  arm  her  against 
Asia. 

He  was  an  enthusiast,  whose  religious  emo- 
tions, uninformed  by  revelation,  took  their 
complexion  from  the  superstitions  of  the  times. 
To  him  a  hermitage  was  as  congenial  as  Hara 
to  Mohammed.  Here  his  excited  fancy  created 
visions  of  saints  and  angels,  of  Jesus,  Mary, 
and  the  martyrs;  and  here  the  arch-deceiver 
inflamed  his  resentment  and  his  zeal,  until  he 
turned  his  willing  dupe  into  the  enraptured 
seer,  commissioned  to  call  the  West,  not  to 
the  humanity  of  the  Prince  of  peace,  but  to 
the  carnival  of  blood  in  Palestine. 

When  he  came  to  Eome,  Urban  the  Second, 
influenced  either  by  .policy  or  fanaticism,  en- 
dorsed his  inspiration  and  cherished  his  burn- 
ing ardour  by  his  pontifical  benediction. 

The  flesh  in  this  extraordinary  man  had 
become  subject  to  the  spirit.  His  strong  and 
wiry  frame,  though  attenuated  by  fasting  and 


THE    CRUSADES.  163 

frenzy,  seemed  but  to  increase  in  its  power  of 
endurance  by  the  energy  of  a  soul  that  ab- 
sorbed and  supplied  its  vitality  with  a  higher 
principle  of  life.  Covered  with  a  coarse  gar- 
ment, with  head  and  feet  bare,  and  swaying  a 
ponderous  crucifix,  he  rode  through  Italy  and 
France,  the  universal  centre  of  an  amazing  in- 
terest, summoning  the  church  to  the  enterprise 
of  a  holy  war. 

There  are  times  in  which  such  an  apparition 
would  but  awaken  the  merriment  of  the  gay 
or  the  pity  of  the  benevolent.  But  the  ex- 
ample and  the  success  of  Mohammed  had  made 
its  impression  on  a  church  which  had  lost  her 
Bible  in  the  manuscripts  of  a  dead  language 
and  had  gone  back  in  the  name  of  the  cross  to 
be  governed  by  a  disguised  paganism,  to  re- 
gard the  shield  and  battle-axe  as  more  reliable 
than  the  sword  of  the  Spirit  in  the  defence  and 
propagation  of  the  gospel.  The  bread  of  the 
sacrament  had  also  become  a  divinity  to  be 
worshipped.  And,  by  an  easy  transition,  the 
sepulchre  of  Jesus  was  invested  with  an  awful 
sanctity. 

A  kiss  imprinted  on  the  black  stone  of  the 
Kaaba  had  never  been  so  impassioned  as  the 
kiss  of  the  pilgrim  on  the  cold  and  stony  floor 
of  a  Saviour's  tomb.     It  was  a  means  of  salva- 


164  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

tion,  a  sign  of  love  and  devotion,  more  merito- 
rious than  penitent  emotions  or  the  righteous- 
ness of  faith. 

And  when  the  dark  eye  of  the  hermit 
flashed  at  the  recital  of  the  wrongs  and  the 
sacrileges  he  himself  had  witnessed,  rage  crim- 
soned every  cheek,  and  the  long-cherished  de- 
sire for  retaliations  on  Asia  turned  into  decrees 
in  the  bosoms  of  princes. 

A  council  of  "two  hundred  bishops,  four 
hundred  of  the  clergy,  and  thirty  thousand  of 
the  laity,"  assembled  at  Placentia.  The  am- 
bassadors also  of  the  emperor  reached  the  spot 
from  Constantinople. 

These  united  in  urging  the  Latins  instantly 
to  arm,  not  to  wait  for  the  inevitable  invasion 
of  Europe,  but  to  anticipate  and  forestall  that 
event  by  becoming  themselves  the  invaders. 

The  vast  concourse  heard  the  recital  of 
dangers  imminent,  and  wrongs  already  inflicted 
on  a  bleeding  church  and  long  endured  with- 
out either  mitigation  or  redress,  with  tears  of 
sympathy,  and  sent  back  to  Alexius  their 
solemn  pledges  of  material  aid. 

From  this  great  council  went  out  also  the 
coadjutors  of  the  hermit,  seconding  his  efforts, 
spreading  themselves  throughout  the  provinces, 
addressing   excited   and  superstitious  crowds, 


THE   CRUSADES.  165 

and   invoking  the  war-spirit  in  the   remotest 
villages. 

France  in  the  same  autumn  became  also  the 
theatre  of  another  vast  conclave,  whose  de- 
liberations ended  in  the  active  mustering  of 
the  armies  of  the  cross. 

From  the  borders  of  France  the  successful 
Peter  led  out  sixty  thousand  fanatics.  &  poor 
soldier  led  on  another  band,  and  still  another 
of  twenty  thousand  started  from  Germany. 
Their  path  was  followed  by  two  hundred 
thousand  more. 

But  these  wild  hordes  were  those  whom  want 
and  crime  had  made  outlaws;  and  the  evils 
they  inflicted  on  their  way  to  Asia  were  cala- 
mities too  grievous  to  bear,  roused  kingdoms  to 
arm  in  self-defence  against  their  fellow-Chris- 
tians, and  suggest  to  us  the  necessity  of  such 
a  drain  upon  European  society  to  make  a  re- 
vival of  true  religion  possible  within  its  limits. 

After  incredible  crimes  and  sufferings,  their 
lawless  thousands  reach  Asia,  and  encounter 
the  Turks  in  the  vicinity  of  Nice.  Here  they 
all  perish.  A  mausoleum  was  made  of  their 
bones  on  the  plains  near  the  city  by  the  vic- 
torious Solyman.  The  princes  and  knights,  the 
priests  and  peasants,  that  composed,  after  them, 
the  better-disciplined  armies  of  the  cross,  were 


166      ISHMAEL  AND  THE  CHURCH. 

men  of  Belial  also,  and  providentially  sepa- 
rated by  their  cruel  and  superstitious  sympa- 
thies from  the  masses  of  a  less  intolerant  and  a 
more  hopeful  humanity. 

Those  that  took  the  cross  and  started  for 
Asia  are  estimated  at  six  millions.  When  this 
eruption  of  human  beings  passed  in  review  be- 
fore the  daughter  of  Alexius,  she  is  said  to  have 
exclaimed,  "Europe  is  loosened  from  her  foun- 
dations and  hurled  against  Asia." 

Before  this  mighty  army  Solyman  is  totally 
defeated,  flies  in  despair  toward  the  Euphrates; 
and,  from  this  period  to  the  end  of  the  Cru- 
sades, Asia  becomes  the  battle-field  of  contend- 
ing nations  and  the  charnel-house  for  their 
bones. 

The  chivalry  of  Europe  were  governed  by  a 
law  of  exalted  gallantry  to  ladies,  and  of  pro- 
found and  senseless  veneration  for  the  minis- 
ters of  a  religion  whose  badge  they  wore  and 
whose  holy  places  they  rescued ;  but  here  ended 
the  virtues  of  these  grim  and  bloody  Caleds  of 
the  North. 

Simon  de  Montfort,  the  beloved  son  and 
champion  of  the  church,  was  a  stanch  mur- 
derer. Courtesy  to  a  lady  was  a  law  of  his 
knighthood;  and  on  one  occasion  he  pre- 
served several  women  from  military  outrage. 


THE   CRUSADES.  167 

But  the  same  Simon  laid  waste  the  country  of 
the  Albigenses  with  fire  and  sword ;  and  when 
the  castle  of  Menerbe,  on  the  frontiers  of 
Spain,  surrendered,  for  the  single  and  only 
crime  of  constancy  in  their  religious  opinions,* 
this  true  specimen  of  Western  chivalry  united 
with  the  papal  legate  in  arranging  the  fagots 
and  in  kindling  the  fire  that  burned  to  death  a 
hundred  and  forty-one  Christians  of  both  sexes. 

"The  sword  of  Godfrey  divided  a  Turk 
from  the  shoulder  to  the  haunch,  and  one-half 
of  the  infidel  fell  to  the  ground,  while  the 
other  was  transported  by  his  horse  to  the  city 
gate.  As  Kobert  of  Normandy  rode  against  his 
antagonist,  'I  devote  thy  head/  he  piously 
exclaimed,  'to  the  demons  of  hell;'  and  that 
head  was  instantly  cloven  to  the  breast  by  the 
resistless  stroke  of  his  descending  falchion. "f 

When  Jerusalem  fell  into  the  hands  of  the 
Crusaders,  Bohemond  and  Tancred,  Baldwin, 
Godfrey,  the  Koberts,  and  others,  the  illus- 
trious leaders  in  the  siege,  followed  by  trains 
of  devotees,  and  with  heads  and  feet  bare,  as- 

*  For  the  same  offence,  in  this  crusade  against  the 
Albigenses,  a  million  were  slain  in  France  alone.  Knights 
and  Ecclesiastics  united  in  the  work  of  slaughter  "  with 
infinite  joy."  (See  Sismondi's  History.) 

f  Gibbon,  vol.  v.  p.  581. 


168      ISHMAEL  AND  THE  CHURCH. 

cended  the  slopes  of  Calvary  to  bedew  with 
tears  the  precious  sepulchre  of  the  Lord,  and 
to  imprint  their  tenderest  kisses  on  its  walls. 

Incredible,  however,  to  relate,  these  very 
men,  so  intensely  Christian  as  to  make  even 
the  rock  touched  once  by  the  body  of  Jesus 
most  sacred  in  their  esteem,  had  just  arisen 
from  the  banquet  of  blood, — had  just  massacred 
seventy  thousand  of  all  ages  and  sexes  with- 
out mercy  or  discrimination.  For  three  days 
the  area  of  the  slaughter-house  stretched  from 
wall  to  wall  throughout  Jerusalem.  The  cry 
for  mercy  and  the  crash  of  the  battle-axe  re- 
sounded on  every  side;  and,  thus  reeking  in 
the  blood  of  recent  murder,  came  these  unre- 
lenting men  up  the  sides  of  Calvary  to  worship 
the  sepulchre. 

Such  were  the  men,  whose  tender  mercies 
were  cruel,  from  whom  Europe  and  the  church 
had  been  delivered  by  the  armies  of  the  cross, 
that  for  one  hundred  and  ninety  years  bound 
the  sultanies. 


CHAPTER  XXI. 

PETER   WALDO   ON    THE    TRACK    OF    PETER    THE 
HERMIT. 

"  When  Waldo,  flying  from  the  apostate  West, 
In  German  wilds  his  righteous  cause  confess'd." 

Montgomery. 

Let  us  now  turn  to  Zion  in  the  wilderness ; 
and,  while  Ishmael  takes  peace  from  the  world 
in  Asia,  it  will  be  interesting  to  trace  the  pro- 
gress of  the  church  left  behind  by  that  flood, 
of  reprobate  humanity  disappearing  in  suc- 
cessive surges  in  Oriental  aceldemas. 

Fifteen  years  after  the  commencement  of 
the  second  Crusade,  and  forty-four  years  before 
the  establishment  of  the  Inquisition,  a.d.  1206, 
there  occurs  a  very  interesting  revival  of  re- 
ligion. 

To  Peter  Waldo  is  the  church  indebted  for 
the  first  modern  translation  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment in  the  vulgar  tongue.  This  translation, 
and  his  apostolic  zeal  and  success,  made  him 
the  object  of  papal  persecution.     Himself  and 

15  L  109 


170  ISIOIAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

followers  fled  from  Lyons;  and,  as  they  went, 
they  spread  everywhere  the  principles  and  the 
impulses  of  the  Reformation.  The  existing 
churches  caught  the  spirit  of  their  afflicted 
brethren,  and  the  attack  on  Waldo  became  a 
wide-spread  source  of  salvation. 

In  the  province  of  Picardy — the  place  of  the 
nativity  of  Peter  the  Hermit,  and  on  which 
region  he  drew  most  largely — Peter  Waldo 
found  a  generation  of  right-minded  men.  Here 
his  success  was  great,  among  a  people  that 
would  not  be  induced  to  expel  him  or  renounce 
his  doctrine. 

Philip  Augustus  invaded  this  favoured  spot, 
battered  down  three  hundred  houses  and 
several  walled  towns,  and  pursued  the  flying 
converts  into  Flanders,  where  several  suffered 
martyrdom. 

Peter  himself  escaped  into  Bohemia,  another 
broad  and  beautiful  valley  drained  of  its 
bigots  to  recruit  the  armies  of  the  cross.  Here 
the  word  of  God  grew  and  multiplied.  In 
Bulgaria,  Croatia,  Dalmatia,  and  Hungary,  in 
Alsace,  and  along  the  valleys  of  the  Rhine, 
powerful  revivals  spread  their  healing  influ- 
ence. Persecutions  indeed  arose;  hundreds 
were  imprisoned  or  slain ;  but  Christianity 
was  not  exterminated,  as  it  was  ultimately  in 


PETER   WALDO.  171 

Spain  and  Calabria,  as  it  might  well  have  been 
over  all  Europe  but  for  the  Crusades. 

In  a.d.  1228,  Keinerius  Saccho,  the  Roman 
Inquisitor,  represents  their  numbers  to  have 
been  very  great,  the  sect  to  have  been  most 
generally  diffused  through  every  part  of  Europe 
and  found  in  all  its  circles. 

Certain  French  bishops  "desired  the  monks 
of  the  Inquisition  to  defer  a  little  their  work 
of  imprisonment  till  the  Pope  was  advertised 
of  the  great  numbers  apprehended, — numbers 
so  great  that  it  was  impossible  to  defray  the 
charges  of  their  subsistence,  and  even  to  pro- 
vide stone  and  mortar  to  build  prisons  for 
them."*  But  would  such  a  difficulty  in  the 
work  of  extermination  have  stayed  its  pro- 
gress, had  not  the  bigotry  of  Rome  wasted  its 
energies  in  its  foreign  wars  ? 

Along  the  bloody  trail  of  that  demon  army, 
had  it  been  permitted  to  sweep  through  the 
Alps,  we  would  not  have  gathered  up  a  rem- 
nant from  the  papal  slaughter-houses  of  eight 
hundred  thousand  Waldenses,  nor  would  the 
blood  of  a  million  martyrs  in  the  twelfth 
century  have  been  the  seed,  but  rather  the 
grave,  of  the  church. 

*  Millner,  vol.  ii.  p.  65. 


172  ISHMAEL  AND   THE   CHURCH. 

The  four  sultanies  are  bound  for  Zion's  sake; 
kept  back  from  invading  Europe,  curbed  with- 
in the  valleys  of  the  Euphrates,  to  subserve 
the  purposes  of  salvation ;  and  the  very  hand 
that  forges  the  restraints  that  bind  them  is  the 
hand  of  a  parricide,  turned  from  the  home 
his  remorseless  cruelty  would  otherwise  have 
desolated,  to  grapple  with  Ishmael  and  perish 
at  last  himself  in  the  fruitless  struggle. 

The  history  of  Ishmael,  or  of  the  Crusaders 
in  their  Asiatic  wars,  is  but  the  recital  of  the 
outrages,  the  woes,  and  the  strifes  of  ages. 

And,  as  the  panorama  opens  in  the  fierce 
reprisals  of  the  desert,  or  unfolds  itself  in  the 
empire  of  the  caliphs,  or  shifts  again  in  the 
rise  of  the  Turks  or  the  wars  of  the  cross, 
we  have  but  the  painful  reproductions  suc- 
cessively, with  but  little  variation,  of  the  same 
sad  pictures  of  ruin.  And  from  it  we  in- 
stinctively turn  away. 

But,  when  the  church  is  ever  the  centre  of 
a  thrilling  interest  in  heavenly  places,  and  men 
and  wars  and  empires  are  made  to  be  subsidiary 
to  its  preservation,  (though  they  knew  it  not,) 
then  the  aspect  of  unalleviated  violence  and 
wrong  is  mitigated,  and  Ave  watch  that  frail 
ark,  now  in  the  trough  of  the  sea,  and  now  on 
the  crest  of  the  surge,  and  now  in  the  eddies 


PETER   WALDO.  173 

of  the  Maelstrom,  with  an  emotion  of  gratified 
wonder  and  veneration ;  since,  while  one  and 
another  among  the  mighty  disappear, — since 
Egypt,  Babylon,  Greece,  Kome,  the  caliphs, 
and  the  Crusaders,  struggle  in  vain  in  that  wild 
uproar  and  are  successively  dashed  upon  the 
rocks, — that  frail  ark,  invested  with  a  protected 
life,  piloted  by  an  unseen  hand,  encounters 
and  survives  the  same  dangers,  and  is  seen  to 
emerge  at  last  from  the  night  of  ages  and  the 
wreck  of  empires,  itself  unchanged,  unharmed, 
as  when  first  it  was  floated  out  and  left  to 
make  its  own  perilous  way  across  the  dark 
and  pathless  ocean. 

Milton's  wars  of  angels  are  invested  with 
interest,  since  the  good  oppose  the  bad  and 
triumph,  and  Heaven  shines  all  the  brighter 
for  the  trial  of  her  imperilled  and  preserved 
virtue.  And  this  it  is  that  makes  the  world's 
prophetic  history  most  interesting;  since  the 
bride,  the  Lamb's  wife,  is  ever  the  centre  of  an 
amazing  love,  the  ultimate  care  of  a  resistless 
Providence.  Around  her  otherwise  defence- 
less home  the  angels  keep  perpetual  vigil,  and 
in  her  palaces  God  is  known  for  a  refuge. 

And,  while  she  is  often  at  the  very  verge  of 
an  inevitable  destruction,  she  is  all  the  more 
pure  for  her  trials  and  her  triumphs.     And  we 

15* 


174  ISnMAEL  AND   THE   CIIURCn. 

love  for  her  sake  to  glance  over  earth's  bloody 
annals,  not  simply  to  gather  and  chronicle  the 
details  of  wars  and  wrongs, — subjects  only  and 
always  revolting, — but  for  her  sake,  that  we 
may  gaze  after  her  through  the  dark  night 
and  in  the  deep  sea  where  she  is  ever  followed 
by  the  outgoings  of  those  feet  once  nailed  to 
the  cross  for  her  sins  and  that  ever  tread  down 
for  her  the  fury  of  the  waves. 


CHAPTER  XXII. 

CONSTANTINOPLE   MENACED. 

"  Greece !  thine  ancient  lamp  is  spent : 
Thou  art  thine  own  monument." 

Montgomery. 

From  a.d.  1063 — at  which  point  of  time  we 
commence  our  reckoning  of  the  hour,  the  day, 
the  month,  and  the  year,  of  this  prophecy — to 
the  fall  of  Constantinople,  in  a.d.  1453,  there 
stretches  an  interval  of  three  hundred  and 
ninety-one  years. 

The  Crusaders  lose  Acre,  the  Holy  Land, 
and  disappear  from  Asia,  in  A.d.  1291,  leav- 
ing the  sultanies  loose  from  their  long-con- 
tinued restraints  to  rush  forth  upon  abandoned 
Asia  and  impoverished  Europe.  No  sooner  do 
their  foes  disappear,  than,  true  to  their  in- 
stincts, they  begin  to  execute  before  the  time 
their  terrible  mission.  They  at  once  spread 
their  conquests  over  Komania,  Anatolia,  and 
across  into  Europe  as  far  as  the  Danube.  Con- 
stantinople is  itself  invested,  and  lies  at  the 
mercy  of  the  foe. 

175 


176  ISIIMAEL   AND   THE    CHUKCH. 

"  The  third  part  of  men"  are  thus  unexpect- 
edly placed  in  imminent  peril  of  being  slain, 
and  that  long  before  the  fulness  of  the  pro- 
phetic hour.  But  Providence  is  always  equal 
to  all  exigencies.  Its  prepared  and  reserved 
force  rushes  to  the  rescue  of  the  helpless  city 
and  binds  again  the  Euphratean  angels. 

In  a.d.  1356 — about  forty-six  years  before 
Bajazet  menaced  the  falling  throne  of  the 
effeminate  Ca)sars — a  poor  adventurer,  escaped 
from  prison,  flings  himself  into  the  Oxus,  and 
reaches  with  extraordinary  exertions  the  op- 
posite bank.  After  leading  for  some  time  the 
life  of  an  outlaw,  he  returned  to  his  native 
Transoxiana.  Here  he  gathered  around  him 
his  little  army  and  delivered  his  country  from 
the  usurpations  of  its  conquerors.  Ambition 
had  already  taken  full  possession  of  his  soul, 
and  the  fortunate  Tamerlane  now  began  to 
aspire  to  the  conquest  of  the  world. 

In  the  message  that  he  sent  to  Houssein,he 
expressed,  while  yet  an  inferior,  his  aspirations 
and  his  policies : — "  He  who  wishes  to  embrace 
the  bride  of  royalty  must  kiss  her  across  the 
edge  of  the  sharp  sword."  Guided  by  this 
maxim,  he  pursued  his  career  of  conquest  till 
the  twenty-seventh  crown  glittered  on  his 
head. 


CONSTANTINOPLE.  177 

From  Samarcand  to  the  forests  of  Siberia 
the  successful  Tartar  stretched  his  conquests. 
Turning  from  thence,  he  recrossed  the  continent 
to  the  shores  of  the  Indian  Ocean,  subduing 
every  intervening  kingdom  by  his  resistless 
arms. 

When,  ultimately,  he  became  the  proud 
master  of  this  wide  domain,  he  still  panted  for 
other  and  still  more  illustrious  acquisitions. 
And,  being  told  of  the  sudden  and  successful 
irruptions  of  the  ambitious  sultan, — of  his  de- 
signs upon  the  capital  of  the  Caesars, — the  tale 
inflamed  his  envy,  and,  leaving  the  banks  of 
the  Ganges,  he  determined  to  humble  his  rival 
in  the  fields  of  his  triumphs. 

His  military  preparations  were  made  upon  a 
scale  suited  to  the  greatness  and  difficulty  of 
the  enterprise;  and  in  due  time  his  victorious 
army  swept  over  the  snow-clad  hills  of  Georgia, 
and  brought,  as  he  intended,  the  line  of  his 
operations  in  conflict  with  those  of  Bajazet. 

And  now  opens  the  angry  and  menacing  cor- 
respondence which  issues  in  the  defeat  and 
ruin  of  the  latter.  "  Thou  art  no  more  than  a 
pismire:  why  wilt  thou  seek  to  provoke  the 
elephant?  Alas!  they  will  trample  thee 
under  their  feet,"  said  the  scornful  Tamerlane. 
"  If,"  replied  Bajazet,  with  a  sneer  of  studied 


178  ISHMAEL   AND  THE   CHURCH. 

insolence,  "  thou  hast  not  courage  to  meet  me 
in  the  field,  mayest  thou  again  receive  thy 
wives  after  they  have  thrice  endured  the  em- 
braces of  strangers !" 

These  were  words  of  offence  never  to  be  for- 
gotten by  the  enraged  Mogul.  And,  alas  for 
Bajazet !  it  was  not  his  hour.  And,  as  though 
in  derision  of  his  weakness  and  of  his  impudent 
haste,  Providence  gives  him  up  to  defeat  and 
ruin.  He  is  taken  prisoner  by  Tamerlane,  put 
in  an  iron  cage,  and  made  a  spectacle  to  Asia 
and  the  world. 

The  bonds  that  had  so  long  bound  the  sul- 
tanies  had  been  snapped  in  the  disappearance 
of  the  Crusaders.  The  Turks  had  broken  forth 
to  anticipate  the  will  of  Heaven  and  fulfil  be- 
fore the  time  their  bloody  mission ;  but  the 
strong  arm  of  the  Mogul  is  lifted  up  from  the 
distant  Ganges,  and  the  daring  Bajazet  is 
caught  like  a  wild  beast  escaped  from  the 
menagerie,  and  recaged  in  the  neighbourhood 
of  the  doomed  capital. 

And  now,  if  ever,  the  fierce  Tartar  is  in  the 
very  position  to  become  the  proud  master  of 
the  East  and  the  West.  But,  strange  to  relate, 
in  the  very  vicinity  of  the  empire-city,  and  at 
the  period  and  in  the  very  conjuncture  most 
propitious,  and  still  filled  with  the  long-che- 


CONSTANTINOPLE   MENACED.  179 

rislied  desire  for  the  world's  subjugation,  he 
most  unaccountably  turns  from  the  key  of 
power,  from  the  city's  protected  walls, — and 
his  victorious  hordes  vanish  forever  in  the  dis- 
tant East. 

Both  Tamerlane  and  Bajazet  were  devout 
Mohammedans,  sympathized  with  each  other 
in  their  opposition  to  an  idolatrous  church,  and 
alike  desired  the  fall  of  Greece  and  Rome. 
United,  two  of  the  best  generals  of  their  times, 
and  they  at  the  head  of  a  combined  army  of 
twelve  hundred  thousand  men,  would  have 
appeared  in  the  field,  and  not  only  Constanti- 
nople, but  exhausted  Europe,  must  have  formed 
at  last  on  her  Atlantic  slopes  the  western  ter- 
minus of  the  Mohammedan  emnire. 

Such  spirits,  however,  could  not  unite ;  and 
Christendom  escaped  because  the  processes  of 
the  assigned  preparation  could  not  be  com- 
pleted until  the  time  of  the  end. 

Scarcely  had  this  vision  of  approaching  doom 
vanished,  when  others  became  equally  appal- 
ling and  imminent,  and  imploring  cries  for  aid 
were  spread  over  the  West.  But  the  West  had 
already  wasted  their  best  energies  in  a  strife 
in  which  they  had  won  and  lost  a  tomb  at 
an  incalculable  sacrifice. 

And  neither  was  the  West  filled  any  longer 


180  ISHMAEL   AND   THE  CIIURCH. 

with  bigoted  men  ready  to  fly  to  arms  on  the 
first  summons.  That  generation  had  passed 
away.  The  rust  had  dissolved  their  armour 
and  death  had  congealed  their  blood. 

The  great  schism  also,  in  which  three  papal 
bishops  claimed  each  for  himself  the  pontificate, 
had  augmented  the  general  apathy;  and,  though 
unity  had  been  restored,  in  the  election  of 
Martin  the  Fifth,  and  in  his  ascension  to  the 
chair  of  St.  Peter,  a.d.  1417,  still,  emotions 
of  deep  dissatisfaction  pervaded  the  masses. 
The  union  was  the  harmony  of  electric  clouds, 
exposed  at  every  turn  of  the  wind  to  an  ex- 
plosion that  would  scatter  them  again. 

The  confederate  kingdoms  of  the  West  had, 
many  of  them,  united  in  earnestly  demanding 
the  reformation  of  the  church  in  its  "head  and 
in  its  members."  The  Council  of  Constance, 
which  had  assembled  for  the  ostensible  purpose 
of  carrying  out  the  popular  wish,  sent  John 
Huss  and  Jerome  of  Prague  to  the  stake,  re- 
moved from  office  the  three  contending  popes, 
and  elected  Martin  the  Fifth  as  their  successor. 
But,  alas  !  this  was  all :  no  other  reformation 
occurred.  It  had  been  promised;  but,  still,  all 
the  evils  complained  of  continued  to  reign. 

Mutual  confidence  had   been   lost;  no  one 
could  trust  another.     Social  honour  and  do 


CONSTANTINOPLE.  181 

mestic  happiness  had  alike  disappeared.  Jus- 
tice had  wholly  forsaken  the  councils  of  the 
church,  and,  indeed,  all  the  tribunals  which 
were  under  the  reach  and  rule  of  the  clergy. 
True  piety,  outraged  and  wronged,  saw  its 
ablest  and  purest  defenders  perish  at  the  stake 
or  vanish  in  the  dungeons  of  the  Inquisition. 

The  few  controlled  the  many.  They  were 
in  power ;  and  the  popular  conscience,  without 
an  organization  in  which  it  could  gain  indi- 
viduality and  utterance,  broke  forth  only  in 
its  desultory  and  abortive  expostulations. 

But  still  there  prevailed  everywhere  the  deep 
impressions  of  unredressed  grievances,  of  un- 
atoned  wrong;  and  therefore  the  power,  if  even 
the  will  had  existed,  to  revive  the  fanaticism 
of  a  previous  age  once  more,  had  disappeared 
forever. 

A  new  class  of  religious  teachers  and  influ- 
ences were  weakening  everywhere  the  bands  of 
Rome.  New  ideas,  in  the  bosoms  of  thousands, 
were  beginning  to  struggle  into  life  and  to  call 
for  other  leaders  in  church  and  state  of  more 
hopeful  and  holier  sympathies. 

An  apathy  with  respect  to  the  perpetual 
encroachments  of  the  Turks  had,  in  conse- 
quence, spread  itself  over  the  entire  West. 

Such  was  at  this  time  the  state  of  the  popu- 

]6 


182  ISHMAEL   AND    THE    CHURCH. 

lar  mind,  that  Peter  the  Hermit,  had  he  been 
reproduced,  must  have  failed  to  have  made 
any  considerable  general  impression.  And  if 
the  perfidious  Martin,  or  the  corrupt  ministers 
of  a  communion  rendered  execrable  by  its 
shameless  impieties,  had  attempted  to  raise  an 
army  to  defend  the  altars  of  the  East  from  the 
desecration  of  Islamism,  the  effort  would  have 
been  met  with  an  emotion  akin  to  a  desire  for 
a  change  even  to  the  latter  as  the  more  hope- 
ful regime. 

Popery  had  become  a  worn-out  harlot,  whose 
shameless  effrontery  shocked  even  the  common 
sentiments  of  natural  religion,  and  on  whose 
withered  cheek  there  was  no  blush. 

When,  therefore,  Tamerlane  left  the  op- 
pressed sultanies,  he  left  them  without  an 
enemy  in  the  field.  The  tempest  from  Europe 
had  expended  its  rage  in  Asia ;  the  wars  of  the 
cross  had  ended,  and  the  fierce  Mogul  had  be- 
come lost  to  all  further  thoughts  of  the  world's 
subjugation.  He  had  slept  his  last  sleep  on 
his  way  to  China.  In  that  sleep  he  dreamed 
no  more  of  battles  and  sieges. 

The  tendency  in  the  several  sultanies  after 
these  events  was  steadily  and  firmly  toward 
a  union  of  their  forces.  Having  for  so  many 
years  experienced  the  evils  of  dissension,  their 


CONSTANTINOPLE.  183 

leading  minds  kept  ever  in  view,  amid  the 
sharp  and  bloody  debates  of  the  successors  of 
the  fallen  sultan,  the  great  advantages  that 
would  accrue  to  them  on  a  permanent  cessa- 
tion of  all  domestic  feuds.  To  the  great  joy 
of  all,  these  terminated  with  the  fall  of  the  last 
pretender  to  the  throne  of  Bajazet. 

From  this  period,  (a.d.  1421,)  Providence  gave 
to  the  Ottomans  successful  leaders  and  armies 
of  disciplined  and  available  courage. 

Mohammed  the  Second,  son  of  Amurath, 
ascended  the  throne  in  the  twenty-first  year  of 
his  age.  His  infant  brothers  were  ruthlessly 
slain,  and  the  insubordination  of  the  janizaries 
was  taught  to  respect  a  master  who  knew  how 
to  revenge  an  affront  and  how  to  direct  and 
exhaust  their  wild  and  fierce  animosities. 
Seven  thousand  useless  falconers  were  turned 
into  citizens  or  soldiers,  and  the  expenses  of 
a  luxurious  court  made  to  minister  to  his  am- 
bitious desire,  —  a  desire  that  fixed  and  ex- 
pended itself  solely  on  the  conquest  of  Con- 
stantinople. 

To  this  all  things  else  bowed  and  contri- 
buted. The  pleasures  of  his  youth  were  for- 
gotten and  absorbed  in  the  workings  of  a 
mightier  passion.  It  impelled  him  in  the  day- 
time to  extraordinary  efforts,  and  broke  his 


184  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

rest  at  night.  His  very  clemency  was  studied. 
His  gifts  of  gold,  titles,  or  place,  alike  pointed 
the  soldier  to  the  walls  of  the  coveted  city. 
His  very  words  burned  with  an  enthusiasm 
which  communicated  to  his  army  a  correspond- 
ing emotion,  and  his  whole  kingdom  resounded 
with  the  din  of  hostile  preparations. 

About  five  miles  from  Constantinople,  on  the 
European  side  of  the  Bosphorus,  he  erected  a 
strong  castle.  The  Greeks  became  alarmed 
when  they  saw  thus  boldly  thrown  aside  even 
the  mask  of  peace.  They  ventured  to  expos- 
tulate by  their  ambassadors.  "Return  in 
safety,"  said  the  inflexible  chief,  "but  the 
next  who  delivers  a  similar  message  may  ex- 
pect to  be  flayed  alive."* 

*  Gibbon,  vol.  yi.  p.  375. 


CHAPTER  XXIII. 

THE  FALL   OF   CONSTANTINOPLE. 

"  Then  the  mighty  pour'd  their  breath ; 
Slaughter  feasted  on  the  brave : 
'Twas  the  carnival  of  death ; 
'Twas  the  vintage  of  the  grave." 

The  Turks  were  celebrated — as  have  ever 
been  the  Saracens  before  them — for  their  nu- 
merous armies  of  horsemen.  These,  in  pre- 
vious centuries,  had  been  their  sole  reliance  in 
war.  Reposing  in  the  daytime,  their  stealthy 
advance  upon  the  unguarded  frontiers  of  de- 
voted countries  was  made  at  night.  Its  silence 
was  broken  by  the  quick  tramp  of  their  pant- 
ing cavalry.  The  falling  dew  cooled  the  ar- 
dour of  their  blood,  and  moonlit  plains  facili- 
tated their  approach.  Long  before  the  dawn, 
the  shout  of  battle  woke  the  sleepers  to  man 
walls  already  scaled, — to  guard  gates  already 
entered  by  the  victors. 

While  the  Crusaders  relied  on  their  horses 
of  massive  proportions,  steel  armour,  heavy 
swords,  spears,  and  battle-axes,  the  Saracen  and 

16*  M  185 


186  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

Turk  had  hitherto  relied  on  the  use  of  their 
sharp  scimitars,  and  on  the  light-footed,  swift 
steeds  of  the  desert.  With  them,  the  onset, 
the  retreat,  and  the  sudden  onset  again,  to  be 
again  followed  by  a  retreat  and  a  return  to  the 
struggle,  were  but  the  ordinary  evolutions  of 
the  battle-field. 

In  this  sort  of  warfare  they  were  always 
superior  to  the  Christians.  But,  when  brought 
to  close  quarters,  when  the  horse  could  not 
any  longer  aid  their  courage,  they  fell  before 
the  stronger  arm  of  steel-clad  knights.  They 
were  known  as  warriors  formidable  in  the 
saddle  and  in  fields  suited  to  the  operations 
of  an  army  of  trained  horsemen,  but  as  in- 
efficient in  hand-to-hand  fights. 

These  armies  appeared  often  incredibly 
numerous.  Frequent  attempts  were  made  to 
estimate  the  probable  numerical  force  that 
followed  the  invader;  and  at  such  times, 
ordinarily,  the  alarms  of  fear  aided  the  ex- 
aggerations of  the  fancy.  And,  while  all 
agreed  in  stating  the  number  as  that  of 
myriads,  it  was  quite  impossible  to  count 
accurately  the  scattered  and  rushing  squad- 
rons, for  they  were  seen  transiently  and  at 
different  points  on  a  frontier  of  many  hundred 
miles. 


CONSTANTINOPLE.  187 

The  estimates  ranged  usually  at  from  two 
hundred  thousand  to  six  hundred  thousand; 
or,  in  the  language  of  John,  "two  hundred 
thousand  thousand," — a  very  large,  indefinite 
number,  impossible  accurately  to  enumerate, 
yet  oppressing  the  imagination  by  the  vastness 
of  their  supposed  destructive  capabilities. 

But,  when  Mohammed  environed  Constanti- 
nople and  took  it,  not  only  the  horse,  but  also 
the  battering-rams  of  other  days,  had  become 
quite  insignificant  in  comparison  with  the 
newly-discovered  engine  of  destruction  em- 
ployed by  the  conqueror. 

"  Von  Hammer  states  that  he  had  himself 
seen  the  great  cannon  of  the  Dardanelles,  in 
which  a  tailor  who  had  run  away  from  his 
creditors  had  concealed  himself  several  days."* 
A  cannon,  it  is  said,  was  cast  for  Mohammed, 
in  which  the  measure  of  twelve  palms  was 
assigned  to  the  bore,  and  which  propelled  a 
stone  bullet  of  six  hundred  pounds'  weight  the 
distance  of  a  mile,  when  it  buried  itself  a 
fathom  deep  in  the  ground.f 

Anciently,  walled  towns  were  not  built  to 
resist  cannon.  The  fortifications  were  con- 
sidered sufficient  if  battering-rams  would  fail  to 

*  Gibbon,  vol.  vi.  p.  380.  f  Ibid- 


188  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

overthrow  them.  Constantinople  could  with- 
stand these;  but  when  its  walls  were  struck 
by  the  resistless  hail  that  issued  from  amid 
the  fire  and  smoke  and  brimstone  of  the 
Turkish  batteries,  and  from  an  army  of  two 
hundred  and  fifty  thousand  horse  and  foot, 
they  rapidly  crumbled  into  breaches  impos- 
sible to  be  repaired  or  defended. 

The  Turkish  horse,  as  they  swept  through 
the  villages  and  subdued  the  surrounding 
country  to  the  very  gates  of  the  city,  were 
enveloped  in  a  cloud  that  gave  to  them  an 
appalling  indistinctness. 

One  unused  to  such  scenes,  and  not  under- 
standing the  precise  nature  of  the  phenomena, 
could  but  say,  "  Thus  I  saw  the  horses  in  the 
vision  and  them  that  sat  on  them,  having  breast- 
j:>lates  of  fire,  and  of  jacinth,  and  of  brim- 
stone ;"  (i.  e.  the  red,  blue,  and  yellow,  in  the 
unique  costume  of  the  soldiers  composing  this 
strange  army.)  "And  the  heads  of  the  horses 
were  as  the  heads  of  lions,  and  out  of  their 
mouths  issued  fire,  and  smoke,  and  brim- 
stone." 

Forty  days  the  lines  of  cavalry  performed 
their  evolutions,  supported  the  batteries,  ap- 
proached and  retired,  and  incessantly  dis- 
charged their  muskets  over  the  heads  of  the 


CONSTANTINOPLE.  189 

horses.  It  appeared  to  John  that  the  stream 
of  fire  and  smoke  issued  from  the  infuriated 
animals  themselves.  They,  with  their  riders, 
would  for  a  moment  become  visible,  and  seem 
all  the  more  terrible  for  the  indistinctness  with 
which  they  were  seen  and  for  the  incessant 
volleys  that  thundered  from  their  extended 
lines,  enwrapping  the  open  plain  alternately 
in  sulphureous  flames  or  pitchy  darkness. 

To  the  apostle  it  was  not  given  to  know 
what  powder  and  ball  were.  It  was  given 
him  to  be  a  spectator  of  the  novel  spectacle, 
to  behold  the  smoke,  fire,  and  brimstone,  and 
to  know  that  by  these  were  the  third  part  of 
men  killed.  What  this  new  source  of  destruc- 
tion might  be  he  knew  not ;  but,  in  prophetic 
vision,  Ishmael  was  the  first  who  was  seen  to 
employ  it  in  battering  down  the  walls  of  a 
city;  and  John  saw  him  rising  up  in  the 
second  woe,  enwrapped  in  clouds  of  enraged 
brimstone,  which  he  somehow  hurled  with  ter- 
rible effect  upon  the  besieged. 

The  long  rows  of  black  ordnance,  looking 
like  large  boas,  were  stretched  out  at  full 
length  on  the  tops  of  the  numerous  batteries. 
Cannon  have  been  frequently  ornamented  by 
the  founder  with  various  devices  according  to 
his  fancy;  and  that  these  were  made  at  their 


190  ISHMAEL   AND   THE  CHURCH. 

breeches  with  a  coil  like  a  serpent's  tail,  and  at 
their  muzzles  in  the  form  of  a  serpent's  head, 
is  not  improbable. 

One  of  these,  cast  by  order  of  the  sultan  at 
Aclrianople,  was  of  enormous  size.  Sixty  oxen 
were  required  for  its  transportation.  It  had  a 
fellow  on  each  side  of  it  nearly  its  equal.  One 
hundred  and  fifty  of  these  engines  of  ruin,  of 
different  sizes,  were  reported  as  stretching  their 
black  lengths  on  each  battery;  and  fourteen 
of  these  batteries  blazed  at  once  against  the 
tumbling  walls.  "  Their  tails,"  said  the  pro- 
phet, "  were  like  unto  serpents',  and  had  heads, 
and  with  them  they  do  hurt." 

The  Turks  use  a  standard  surmounted  by  a 
crescent  and  adorned  with  one  or  more  tails  or 
tufts  of  hair  from  the  tail  of  a  horse.  The 
number  of  these  tails  indicate  the  number  of 
pachalics  under  the  rule  of  the  chief  whose 
ensign  it  is,  and,  of  course,  his  rank  and  power. 
Many  find  in  this  fact  an  illustration  of  the 
passage  respecting  the  heads  and  tails  with 
which  the  hurt  was  seen  to  have  been  done. 

The  names  of  the  invaders  are  not  given  to 
John.  The  details  are,  nevertheless,  sufficient. 
The  whole  scene  appears  before  him  as  a  tran- 
sient vision.  The  third  part  of  men  are  slain, 
and  he  is  made  to  see  and  to  describe  the  sad 


CONSTANTINOPLE.  191 

event  as  it  presented  itself  to  him,  simply  as  a 
spectator. 

No  actor  in  the  strife  knows  much  about 
what  is  occurring  at  a  little  distance  from  him; 
and,  in  describing  a  siege  or  a  battle,  you  are 
obliged  to  collect  a  number  of  individual  ad- 
ventures and  observations,  so  as  to  form  a 
pretty  correct  picture  of  the  whole  by  com- 
bining and  comparing  them  with  one  another. 
This  is  the  office  of  the  historian.  But  the 
prophet  gives  you  briefly  a  correct  picture  of 
the  general  scene,  without  descending  to  inci- 
dental details  beyond  what  would  be  necessary 
to  identify  the  event  intended. 

John  surveys  at  one  view  the  whole  field  of 
strife.  He  notices  the  army.  It  is  composed 
of  cavalry;  he  hears  its  estimated  numbers, — 
myriads  of  myriads.  He  observes  the  military 
costume  of  the  Turkish  soldiers,  in  which  the 
colours  of  red,  blue,  and  yellow  predominate. 
He  beholds  the  smoke,  fire,  and  brimstone 
enveloping  the  army, — an  unprecedented  phe- 
nomena; the  appearance  of  the  horses,  when, 
at  the  discharge  of  musketry  over  their  heads, 
streams  of  fire  and  brimstone  seemed  to  issue 
from  their  mouths;  and  the*  cannon,  with 
muzzles  like  serpents'  heads  and  breeches  like 
serpents'  tails.     With  an  army  and  with  means 


192     ISHMAEL  AND  THE  CHURCH. 

of  ruin  thus  unique,  he  saw  that  the  third 
part  of  men  were  killed. 

Gibbon  attributes  the  loss  of  the  city,  at  the 
juncture  in  which  it  occurred,  to  a  wound 
which  John  Justiniana  received  from  a  bullet 
or  an  arrow  that  pierced  his  gauntlet.  He 
fled  in  pain  and  despair  from  the  walls  which, 
up  to  that  moment,  he  had  so  bravely  defended. 

The  Latin  auxiliaries  followed  his  example. 
Such  pusillanimity  at  such  a  time  proved  fatal. 
It  was  perceived  by  the  watchful  foe,  and  the 
untiring  Mohammed  flew  along  his  lines, — the 
angel  of  death  to  the  fearful,  and  with  the  re- 
wards of  provinces  and  of  paradise  to  the 
courageous  and  successful  soldier  who  should 
first  mount  the  breaches. 

The  Turks  redoubled  their  exertions.  Their 
battle-shout  resounded  anew  amid  the  roar, 
the  smoke,  the  blaze,  of  fourteen  hundred  can- 
non and  myriads  of  small-arms.  "La  I'laha 
ilia  Alia !  Mohammed  Resoul  Allah !"  "  There 
is  but  one  God !  Mohammed  is  the  prophet  of 
God !"  The  walls  are  prostrated ;  the  breaches 
are  entered ;  Constantine,  the  last  of  the  Csesars, 
is  slain ;  and  on  the  twenty-ninth  day  of  May, 
A.d.  1453,  Mohammed,  surrounded  by  his 
viziers,  pachas,  and  guards,  enters  the  fallen  city 
in  triumph.    From  that  hour  the  capital  of  the 


CONSTANTINOPLE.  193 

East  became  the  capital  of  the  Ottoman  em- 
pire. 

The  Saracens  tormented  those  that  had  not 
the  seal  of  God  in  their  foreheads,  but  left 
them  in  the  possession  often  of  their  homes,  a 
subdued  and  a  tributary  people.  The  Turks 
went  further, — occupied  as  proprietors  the  ter- 
ritories of  the  Greek  church,  and  divided  it 
among  themselves.  The  Greeks  left  their 
homes  and  fled  to  the  West. 

The  Turks  were  prepared  to  slay  the  third 
part  of  men, — to  destroy  the  Greek  empire. 
And  from  their  establishment  in  Bagdad,  a.d. 
1063,  to  the  conquest  of  Constantinople,  a.d. 
1453,  there  stretches  out  just  the  prophetic 
interval  named  by  John: — "an  hour,  a  day,  a 
month,  and  a  year,"  or  a  fraction  over  three 
hundred  and  ninety-one  years, — the  exact 
time  assigned  to  the  appointed  restraint  and 
preparation.  At  the  consummation  of  this 
defined  interval,  the  ruin  is  complete,  and  the 
Empire  of  the  East  disappears  forever  from  the 
map  of  Europe. 


17 


CHAPTER  XXIV. 

THE    MISSION   OF   ISIIMAEL   ONE   OF    STRIFE. 

"  He  came,  he  went,  like  the  simoom, — 
That  harbinger  of  fate  and  gloom 
Beneath  whose  widely-wasting  breath 
The  very  cypress  droops  to  death." 

Byron. 

We  have  now  surveyed  a  period  of  about 
eight  hundred  and  fifty  years,  during  which 
the  great  disturber  and  destroyer  of  the  world's 
peace,  and  that  on  a  scale  most  stupendous, 
has  been  Ishmael.  His  hand,  since  his  scat- 
tered and  isolated  tribes  gained  a  great  nation- 
ality in  Mohammed,  has  been  against  every  man. 
He  has  roused  the  nations  to  arms  in  all  ages. 

His  creed  opposes  him  alike  to  Pagan,  Jew; 
and  Christian.  His  method  of  propagating  it 
leads  him  ever  to  study  and  practise  the  art 
of  war.  When  the  religious  sentiment  is  the 
strongest,  his  fierce  martial  spirit  is  at  its 
height  and  his  enterprises  most  comprehensive. 

His  Saracenic  conquests  involved  the  world 
in  the  strifes  of  centuries.  When  his  decayed 
manhood  revived  again  in  the  sultanies  of  the 

194 


ishmael's  mission.  195 

Euphrates,  his  bloody  trumpet  for  three  hun- 
dred and  ninety-one  years  startled  the  re- 
motest tribes  and  countries.  Its  challenge 
brought  the  Crusaders  from  Europe  in  millions, 
and  the  vast  armies  of  Saladin  from  Africa, 
and  finally  the  mighty  host  of  Tamerlane  from 
the  setting  sun,  to  meet  him  in  the  field  of 
carnage.  During  all  this  interval  he  was  ever 
the  great  disturbing  influence,  breaking  forever 
the  whole  world's  harmonies. 

The  conquests  of  Alexander  the  Great  ex- 
tended over  a  part  of  Asia.  His  progress  was 
that  of  a  courier  rather  than  that  of  a  con- 
queror. He  died  at  the  early  age  of  thirty, 
without  issue  to  occupy  his  vacant  throne. 

The  Goths  and  Vandals  conquered  Italy, 
drove  the  Csesars  to  Constantinople,  and  merged 
their  nationality  in  that  of  the  Romans.  But 
the  wars  of  Ishmael  have  been  carried  into 
every  quarter  of  the  globe;  and,  while  he  has 
absorbed  other  nationalities,  he  has  never  lost 
his  own. 

Christian,  Jew,  or  Pagan,  were  alike  the  ob- 
jects of  his  religious  animosities,  and  their  ex- 
termination alike  grateful  to  his  bloody  creed. 
Others  warred  from  ambition,  for  revenue,  ex- 
tension of  territory,  but  Ishmael  for  these  as 
secondary  grounds  of  invasion  and  conquest. 


196  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

His  prophet  and  his  God  invoked  his  combative 
spirit  into  a  fiercer  life  by  higher  incentives ; 
spread  out  before  him  the  fields,  the  fountains, 
the  gardens,  the  lovely  women,  of  the  upper 
paradise,  to  warm  the  ardour  of  his  blood  and 
to  turn  him  into  both  a  fanatic  and  a  soldier. 
In  him  the  war-spirit  became  the  nourished 
offspring  of  a  religious  sentiment  animated  by 
interest  and  temperament.  Hence  it  is  that 
the  prophecy  receives  a  fulfilment  truly  won- 
derful and  literal  in  his  history. 

Strife  is  his  destiny.  He  was  recently  en- 
gaged at  his  accustomed  work;  succeeded  in 
drawing  into  the  field  of  carnage  with  himself 
three  of  the  most  powerful  transatlantic  na- 
tionalities. The  war-cloud  that  but  yesterday 
hung  heavy  and  dark  over  the  Black  Sea  was 
spread  by  his  murderous  hand.  Those  bones 
that  bleach  on  the  bloody  heights  of  Alma,  In- 
kermann,  and  Sebastopol,  were  gathered  and 
piled  by  him. 

He  sowed  discord  in  the  family  of  the  pa- 
triarch :  God  has  doomed  him  to  discord  ever 
since.  It  is  his  stereotyped  character,  chroni- 
cled in  the  annals  of  every  age;  and  the  sad 
issue  is,  that  it  shall  be  his  end.  His  national 
being  shall  perish  at  last  just  as  it  rose : — in 
a  sea  of  blood. 


CHAPTER  XXV. 

THE  PROVIDENTIAL  WARNING  DISREGARDED. 

Thy  harden' d  cheek  in  wrinkles  set 
The  contrite  tear  hath  never  wet ; 
And  darker  grows  and  darker  yet 
The  shadows  of  the  minaret, 
Portentous  of  thy  doom. 

The  fall  of  the  Empire  of  the  East  was 
Heaven's  menace  to  the  West.  But,  when  the 
warning  admonition  spread  through  Christen- 
dom, it  produced — painful  to  relate — no  re- 
formation. 

The  Council  of  Constance  had  had  its  gath- 
erings and  its  deliberations ;  but  its  prolonged 
sittings  had  been  to  no  good  purpose.  Other 
councils  were  called  to  reform  the  church  "  in 
its  head  and  in  its  members,"  but  equally  in 
vain.  The  recurrence  of  such  councils  was 
finally  prevented  by  a  formal  denial  of  their 
authority. 

The  idolatry  of  the  church  also  remained 
not  only  unchanged,  but  on  the  increase,  in 
the  number  of  devils,  demons,  or  sainted  dead 

17*  197 


198      ISHMAEL  AND  THE  CHURCH. 

who  were  canonized  and  made  objects  of  reli- 
gious veneration.  Eelics  were  multiplied;  holy 
bones  and  garments,  crucifixes  of  wood,  stone, 
gold,  silver,  and  brass,  rose  at  every  crossing, 
surmounted  every  sanctuary,  hung  upon  every 
bosom;  and  idolatry  became  every  day  more 
and  more  visible  and  intolerable. 

The  murders  committed  by  Innocent  III. 
on  the  Albigenses,  the  awful  tortures  of  the 
Inquisition,  the  streams  of  righteous  blood  that 
had  been  shed,  and  that  had  for  successive 
ages  purpled  the  Rhine,  the  Rhone,  and  the 
rivers  and  fountains  of  the  Ligurian  Alps,  were 
still  stains  of  guilt  unwashed  by  the  tears  of 
repentance  or  by  the  blood  of  atonement. 

When  the  Council  of  Constance  held  its 
prolonged  sittings,  it  reformed  not,  it  repented 
not,  but  lured  to  its  den  of  deceit  and  cruelty 
the  pure  and  zealous  Huss,  and  the  eloquent 
and  learned  Jerome  of  Prague.  Their  true 
and  enlightened  piety  was  adjudged  to  be  their 
crime.  They  testified  not  against  the  priests 
as  priests,  but  they  testified  against  them  as 
bad  men.  Promises  of  safe  conduct  were 
shamelessly  violated.  They  were  imprisoned, 
and  finally  burned  at  the  stake. 

In  this  council  there  were  no  regrets  for  the 
past.     It  destroyed  the  books  of  Wiclifie ;  vio- 


WARNING   DISREGARDED.  199 

lated  his  resting-place  to  burn  his  bones,  that 
it  might  show  every  possible  indignity  to  the 
memory  of  the  just.  In  the  most  solemn 
manner  did  the  emperor,  his  court  and  nobles, 
surrounded  by  kings  and  princes,  by  popes  and 
cardinals,  by  every  centre  of  influence  and  re- 
sponsibility in  church  and  state,  in  a  vast 
oecumenical  council,  justify  in  a  formal  and 
solemn  declaration,  practically  and  publicly 
made,  the  acts  of  violence,  oppression,  and 
murder,  which  had  for  ages  cried  to  Heaven 
for  redress. 

To  warn  these  guilty  generations  of  the  ap- 
proaching retribution  if  they  repented  not, 
the  Eastern  estates  of  the  church  were  sub- 
verted, the  third  part  of  men  slain. 

The  warning,  however,  was  unheeded.  The 
outrages  against  Huss  and  Jerome  were  fol- 
lowed by  persecutions  against  their  numerous 
followers ;  and  up  to  the  time  of  the  great  Ke- 
formation  of  the  sixteenth  century  nothing  is 
more  obvious  than  the  continued  impenitence 
and  increasing  corruptions  of  the  Koman  church: 
— her  sorceries  or  pretended  miracles, — her  for- 
nications, too  gross  even  for  Mohammedan  con- 
sciences,— her  thefts,  obtaining  money  on  false 
pretences  by  the  sale  of  indulgences, — all  con- 
tinued to  be  practised  and  to  increase  in  their 


200  ISHMAEL  AND   THE   CHURCH. 

shameless  effrontery  up  to  the  time  cf  Tetzel's 
conflict  with  the  indignant  Luther. 

And  even  now,  with  all  the  light  of  three 
hundred  years  poured  upon  Europe,  her  papal 
kingdoms  are  still  full  of  darkness;  and  the 
whole  civilized  world  has  been  called  with 
pain  to  hear  of  the  deification  of  the  Virgin 
Mary, — to  see  her  made,  in  the  dogmas  of 
Koine,  the  fourth  person  in  the  Godhead. 

"And  the  rest  of  the  men  which  were  not 
killed  by  these  plagues  yet  repented  not  of  the 
works  of  their  hands,  that  they  should  not 
worship  devils,  and  idols  of  gold,  and  silver, 
and  brass,  and  stone,  and  of  wood;  which 
neither  can  see,  nor  hear,  nor  walk :  neither 
repented  they  of  their  murders,  nor  of  their 
sorceries,  nor  of  their  fornications,  nor  of  their 
thefts."* 

*  Rev.  ix.  20. 


CHAPTER  XXYI. 

THE   ANTECEDENTS   OF   THE    REFORMATION. 

"A  hundred  years  hence  ye  shall  render  an  account  of  your 
doings  to  God  and  to  me." — John  Huss  before  his  judges. 

"When  Jesus  ascended  to  heaven  a  bright 
cloud  received  him  out  of  sight.  In  the  vision 
of  John*  which  immediately  followed  that  of 
the  second  woe,  he  reappears,  surrounding 
himself  with  the  tokens  of  a  departed  deluge. 
The  bow  is  painted  on  the  cloud  in  which  he 
is  clothed,  and  by  which  we  are  assured  that, 
whatever  alternations  in  the  future  might  oc- 
cur, yet  the  church  should  not  again  be  sur- 
rounded and  overwhelmed  by  the  flood  of  a 
universal  ungodliness. 

In  the  great  apostasies  which  had  succeeded 
the  joyous  progress  of  a  primitive  Christianity, 
the  world  had  lost  its  balance.  Its  vast  reser- 
voirs of  depravity  had  emptied  their  basins, 
and  the  ruined  hulk  had  floated  on  for  a2fes  in 

o 

*  Rev.  x.  1. 

N  201 


202  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

its  starless  and  desolate  track.  But  the  in- 
timations now  are,  in  this  new  vision,  that  it 
is  turning  back  again  on  its  own  axis,  and  that 
it  should  never  fall  in  a  similarly  disastrous 
manner  from  its  zone. 

The  bow  on  the  cloud  is  the  symbol  of  a 
receding  flood.  The  angel's  face  also  is  like 
the  sun  rising  on  the  ark  on  the  morning  of 
that  day  in  which  it  was  opened.  The  mists 
of  the  mediaeval  night  were  vanishing,  and  the 
green  and  joyous  earth  was  seen  rising  once 
more  above  the  loosened  fountains  of  the  great 
deep.  The  open  book  in  his  mighty  hand,  it 
is  intimated  also,  could  not  be  closed  again  a 
second  time  as  it  had  been,  upborne  as  it  was 
by  such  a  hand,  and  that,  too,  amid  the  lumi- 
nous and  irresistable  outgoings  of  his  mighty 
providence  on  land  and  sea.  If  the  land 
should  prove  less  favourable  where  his  left  foot 
less  firmly  and  less  favourably  rested,  then  the 
sea  should  prove  more  propitious  to  the  exodus 
of  his  flying  people  into  a  better  land. 

In  this  manner  is  introduced  to  us  the  next 
great  series  of  events  occasioned  by  the  con- 
quests of  Ishmael, — viz. :  the  dispersion  of  the 
expatriated  Greeks  over  the  kingdoms  of  the 
West,  and  the  consequent  spread  and  popu- 
larity of  the  language  in  which  the  Scriptures 


THE    REFORMATION.  203 

were  written  and  from  which  they  were  to  be 
translated,  the  discovery  of  the  art  of  printing 
and  of  a  new  continent,  and  the  exodus  of  the 
church,  together  with  the  death  and  resurrec- 
tion of  the  witnesses, — events  that  culminate  at 
the  disappearance  of  the  second  woe.  At  the 
close  of  the  prophet's  narrative  respecting  these, 
it  is  said,  without  any  other  regard  to  time 
and  manner  as  to  the  occurrence,  and  just  as 
though  it  had  been  simply  incidental,  "  The 
second  woe  is  past." 

So  the  husbandman,  annoyed  by  the  marsh 
spreading  its  stagnant  basins  for  leagues  around, 
sees  on  a  sudden  the  lake  that  feeds  it  escape 
from  the  hill  and  rush  to  the  sea.  The  head- 
long plunge  of  that  resistless  torrent  completely 
rivets  his  attention.  He  does  not  observe  that, 
at  the  same  time,  the  pestilential  marsh  has 
also  been  drained.  He  sees  the  lake  dried  up, 
the  torrent  shrunk  to  a  little  rivulet,  creeping 
silently  along  in  the  bottom  of  the  torn  chan- 
nel, and  finally  discovers  also,  and  with  grati- 
tude, that  the  spongy  soil  of  the  marsh  has 
become  arable  land. 

In  like  manner  the  attention  of  the  disciple 
is  perfectly  absorbed  by  the  amazing  scenes 
that  were  passing  before  him.  The  vision  of 
the  angel  with  an  open  book,  of  the  witnesses 


204      ISHMAEL  AND  THE  CHURCH. 

and  their  fortunes,  of  the  fall  of  the  tenth  part 
of  the  city, — these  obliterate  for  the  time  the 
recollections  of  the  past  and  turn  off  his  eye 
from  contemporaneous  occurrences.  But,  when 
he  recovers  his  self-possession,  he  perceives  also 
that  these  mighty  changes  have  borne  away 
the  second  woe,  and  he  exclaims,  "  The  second 
woe  is  past." 

In  order,  therefore,  to  reach  the  event, — viz. : 
this  disappearance  of  the  second  woe,* — it  will 
be  necessary  to  follow  in  the  track  of  the  pro- 
phet through  the  causes  that  immediately  pre- 
cede and  produce  it. 

The  great  Reformation  of  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury is  one  of  these.  It  influences,  finally  and 
fatally,  the  destiny  of  the  second  woe;  while, 
at  the  same  time,  its  origin  is  in  the  second 
woe  as  one  of  its  remote  causes,  and  its  best 
successes  were  secured  by  the  indirect  aid  of 
the  worst  forms  of  that  woe : — 

"  It  was  commanded  [the  Saracens]  that  they 
should  not  hurt  the  grass  of  the  field,  neither 
any  green  thing,  neither  any  tree;  but  only 
those  men  that  have  not  the  seal  of  God  in 
their  foreheads."  While  the  injuries  inflicted 
were  not  to  fall  on  Zion,  they  were  to  fall  on 

*  The  fail  of  the  Ottoman  empire. 


THE    REFORMATION.  205 

her  foes, — were  to  employ  and  absorb  their  de- 
structive energies,  to  suspend  and  confound 
their  cruel' policies.  Zion,  in  the  mean  time, 
was  to  escape, — was  to  be  the  spectator  of  a 
conflict  in  which  the  wild  beasts  had  left  the 
prey  to  devour  each  other. 

This  in  a  good  degree  proved  true  also  with 
respect  to  the  Ottomans.  The  barbarous  lords 
of  the  Eastern  capital  despised  the  culture  of 
its  educated  sons,  desecrated  their  altars,  and 
buried  their  hopes  in  the  tomb  in  which  they 
had  buried  the  last  of  the  Caesars 

The  consequent  dispersion  of  the  Greeks  be- 
came a  great  event  of  those  times.  The  weep- 
ing exiles  spread  themselves  through  Europe. 
Their  superior  refinement  and  ruined  fortunes 
awakened  universal  sympathy.  Their  elegant 
manners  were  imitated,  their  language  studied, 
and  their  shining  and  solid  attainments  placed 
them  at  the  head  of  Western  universities  and 
awakened  the  emulation  of  the  Latins.  New 
ideas  expanded  the  soul,  and  unaccustomed 
voices  broke  the  slumber  of  ages. 

Among  the  patrons  of  learning,  the  church 
of  Rome  at  this  time  was  most  conspicuous. 
By  her  learned  Erasmus  was  the  Greek  text 
purified  and  prepared  for  the  use  of  her  Pro- 
testant foes;   by  her  treasures  were  teachers 

18 


206  ISHMAEL  AND   THE   CHURCH. 

sustained  and  institutions  endowed;  and  by 
her  hand,  all  unconscious  of  the  tendency  of 
her  own  acts,  was  the  dark  pall  lifted  from 
the  sun.  Its  glance  was  day;  the  revelations 
appalling. 

Alarmed  at  the  outcry  from  the  exposure 
of  her  sores  and  her  sorceries,  she  from  that 
hour  sought  to  hide  her  shame  in  the  covert 
of  her  gloomy  den.  The  fruitful  source  of 
religious  error  and  of  political  anarchy  was  all 
at  once  discovered  by  her  to  have  been  in  the 
revival  of  letters  and  in  the  spread  of  free 
opinions.  She  therefore  addressed  herself  with 
energy  to  the  work  of  reversing  the  alarming 
tendency;  but  in  vain.  The  dike  was  broken, 
the  sea  was  let  loose,  and  its  irresistible  surges 
went  where  she  would  not. 

The  extreme  depravity  of  the  popes,  car- 
dinals, and  religious  orders,  served  also  to 
strengthen  the  tendencies  toward  the  Keforma- 
tion.  A  good  cause  cannot  but  suffer  from  the 
evil  conduct  of  its  advocates,  since  the  masses 
are  superficial,  and  judge  a  system  rather  by 
its  fruits  than  by  its  principles.  But  when, 
while  impiety  and  immorality  is  most  rife  and 
most  unblushing  in  the  church,  her  very  prin- 
ciples are  themselves  assailed  by  the  wisest  and 
the  purest  citizens,  and  held  to  be  the  fruitful 


THE    REFORMATION.  207 

sources  of  "murders,  sorceries,  fornications, 
and  thefts,"  the  long-cherished  feeling  of  vene- 
ration could  not  but  give  place  to  that  of  dis- 
trust and  abhorrence.  Her  continued  impeni- 
tence aided  more  than  all  other  causes  put 
together  to  quicken  the  insulted  consciences 
of  the  people,  and  to  awaken  their  confidence 
in  the  proffered  aid  of  a  holier  ministration. 

Our  religious  prejudices  are  extremely  stern 
and  sensitive.  And  when  Rome  trifled  with 
these,  broke  her  promises,  and  continued  in 
sin,  she  isolated  herself  more  than  ever  from 
popular  sympathies.  The  ties  of  her  power 
were  loosened  and  fell  off  at  every  stride  she 
took  in  the  opposite  direction. 

Oppression  served  but  to  aggravate  the 
rising  animosity.  Books  might  be  burned, 
and  bold  spirits  pay  for  their  temerity  with 
their  lives ;  but  the  spirit  of  reform  could  not 
be  allayed  by  this  course.  It  was  already  a 
living  sentiment  in  the  minds  of  thousands. 
It  rose  stern  and  inflexible,  and  made  some 
great  change  imminent  and  inevitable. 

But  Rome  was  never  more  conscious  of 
safety.  She  rode  a  sea  whose  agitated  surface 
concealed  the  strength  and  the  depth  of  the 
wave  that  convulsed  underneath.  Repentance 
would  have  awakened  confidence ;  but,  with  a 


208  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

fatal  disregard  to  her  character  for  purity 
as  the  source  of  her  influence,  she  threw 
off  the  last  reserves  of  decency,  and  assailed 
in  here  and  there  a  popular  leader,  every  day 
renewedly,  some  one  of  the  great  and  fa- 
vourite ideas  of  the  people.  It  was  a  policy 
most  suicidal.  The  fall  of  every  fresh  victim 
offended  more  deeply  than  ever  the  enlightened 
consciences  of  men,  and  served  but  to  prepare 
them  for  the  testimony  of  the  true  witnesses 
whenever  the  sacred  volume  should  at  length 
be  fully  opened  in  the  vulgar  tongue. 

The  cruelties  of  Rome  tended  also  in  the 
same  direction.  There  is  in  providence  a  just 
resentment,  often  marked  and  palpable  even 
in  this  life,  against  great  social  wrongs,  and 
especially  against  those  of  murder.  And  not 
the  less  sure  and  terrible  are  its  reprisals, 
even  though  the  murder  be  committed  under 
the  forms  of  law,  in  the  holy  name  of  religion, 
and  on  the  plea  of  a  social  or  a  moral  ne- 
cessity. 

The  blood  of  Huss  cried  from  the  ground. 
Armies  sprang  into  being  at  that  cry  to  avenge 
his  death ;  and  the  seeds  of  the  great  Reforma- 
tion were  quickened  into  a  more  vigorous 
germination  by  the  ashes  of  the  martyr.  The 
interference  of  the  Bohemian  nobles  was  all 


THE   REFORMATION.  209 

emotional,  all  uncalculating.  It  was  indeed 
but  the  first  excited  throb  of  a  sympathetic 
humanity, — nevertheless  most  certain  to  settle 
down  ultimately  into  purposes  of  deliberate 
and  organized  retaliation. 

"  Ye  have  put  him  to  a  cruel  and  an  igno- 
minious death,"  said  they,  "though  convicted 

of  no  heresy Ye  have  also  unmercifully 

imprisoned,  and  perhaps  already  put  to  death, 
Jerome  of  Prague, —  a  man  of  most  profound 
learning  and  copious  eloquence.     Him  also  ye 

have  condemned  unconvicted We  are 

resolved  to  sacrifice  our  lives  for  the  defence 
of  the  gospel  of  Christ  and  of  his  faithful 
preachers."  Such  was  the  stern  remonstrance 
of  the  indignant  nobles;  and  for  thirteen  years 
Bohemia  terribly  avenged  her  martyrs  in  the 
Hussite  war. 

It  was  in  after-ages  urged  that  the  safe- 
conduct  granted  to  Luther  ought  not  to  be 
regarded  : — "  that  the  Khine  should  receive 
his  ashes,  as  it  had  received  those  of  Huss  a 
century  ago."  But  the  proposition  was  re- 
garded by  the  Elector  of  Saxony  with  an  emo- 
tion of  horror.  "It,"  said  he,  "has  brought 
too  many  misfortunes  on  the  German  nation 
for  us  ever  to  raise  such  a  scaffold  the  second 
time." 

18* 


210  ISHMAEL   AND    THE    CHURCH. 

That  scaffold  is  an  imperishable  chronicle 
in  the  annals  of  time.  Even  the  cry  of  the 
furious  bishops,  when  Huss  refused  to  recant, 
still  rings  in  our  ears  and  enrages  our  blood. 
"  '  He  is  a  malicious  and  hardened  heretic ! 
Down,  down  from  the  platform!'  With  a 
black  and  weighty  chain  around  his  neck,  he 

was  fastened  to  the  stake The  wood 

having  been  consumed,  the  corpse  continued 
suspended  on  the  stake ;  and  the  executioners, 
having  brought  an  additional  quantity  of  fuel, 
thrust  both  stake  and  corpse  anew  into  the 

fire,  which  consumed  the  whole The 

Papists  dug  out  the  hole  for  a  considerable 
space  around,  conveyed  away  the  earth  and 
ashes  in  carts,  and  cast  the  whole  into  the 
Rhine."* 

"  The  blood  of  the  martyrs  has  ever  been 
the  seed  of  the  church."  She  has  fallen  in 
one  country  but  to  rise  in  another ;  and  over 
that  "platf'f  where  she  fell  God  has  ever 
emptied  a  vial  and  spread  a  troubled  cloud. 
On  that  cloud  the  Elector  had  fixed  his 
anxious  gaze.  It  still  hung  there,  (so  it 
seemed  to  him,)    skirted  with  fire  and  drip- 

*  "  History  of  the  YValdenses,"  vol.  ii.  pp.  24,  25 
-j"  2  Kings  ix.  26. 


THE    REFORMATION.  211 

ping  with  intense  wrath,  over  the  stake  of 
Huss.  The  calamities  of  a  century  had  not 
made  expiation;  and  he  would  not  for  the 
wealth  of  an  empire  see  Germany  "  raise  such 
a  scaffold  a  second  time." 

The  bleeding  remnant  of  the  Albigenses  also 
found  their  way  into  all  the  countries  of  Eu- 
rope. Their  persecutors,  though  they  had 
driven  them  from  their  native  valleys,  had  to 
meet  them  again  in  the  Wicliffites,  the  Huss- 
ites, the  Lutherans  and  the  Calvinists,  of 
after-times.  Such  are  the  laws  of  Providence. 
But  still  the  church  could  never  have  suc- 
ceeded to  any  considerable  extent  in  the  peace- 
ful utterance  of  her  blessed  testimony  without 
the  discovery  of  some  new  world,  in  which 
she  might  have  an  unobstructed  growth,  and 
some  new  appliance  which,  like  the  inspiration 
of  the  primitive  age,  would  reproduce  the 
word,  despite  every  effort  to  destroy  it. 

When  inspiration  ceased,  the  early  church, 
having  but  little  access  to  the  pure  word  of 
God,  dwindled  amid  surrounding  corruptions 
and  oppressions,  and  at  the  end  of  the  third 
century  was  thought  to  have  been  almost 
extinct.  From  that  period  to  the  beginning 
of  the  sixteenth  century  it  steadily  declined, 
and  has  often  been  on  the  very  verge  of  ruin. 


212  ISIDfAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

Asia,  Africa,  Europe,  were  all  lost  to  her  in 
the  total  apostasy  of  her  professed  friends; 
and  the  small  remnant  of  her  desolate  children 
wandered  about  in  sheep-skins  and  goat-skins 
in  the  fastnesses  of  inaccessible  mountains 
and  in  the  solitudes  of  wildernesses,  prolong- 
ing a  precarious  and  an  afflicted  life  amid  all 
uncertainties  and  all  sufferings. 

The  causes  that  tended  toward  the  great 
Keformation  and  that  urged  it  forward,  except- 
ing those  yet  to  be  named,  had  all  existed 
in  previous  ages,  under  equally  favourable 
circumstances;  and  all  had  proved  abortive. 
Charles,  when  he  regretted  that  he  had  not 
slain  Luther  at  Worms,  and  thus  had  strangled 
the  Keformation  in  its  cradle,  judged  incor- 
rectly of  the  influence  of  that  event;  because 
this  reformation,  unlike  any  other  since  the  time 
of  the  apostles,  connected  itself  with  the  art 
of  printing  and  with  the  discovery  of  a  new 
continent.  These  gave  to  the  church  a  van- 
tage-ground which  Providence  had  never  given 
her  before:  these  will  require,  therefore,  a  par- 
ticular review. 


CHAPTER    XXVII. 

THE   ART   OF    PRINTING   AND   THE    REFORMATION. 

"That  church,  o'erborne,  depress'd,  unpeopled,  dead, 
Oft  from  the  dust  of  ruin  raised  its  head." 

Montgomery. 

In  God's  economy,  a  knowledge  of  the  gospel 
is  made  essential  to  salvation.  Men  cannot 
see  without  light;  nor  can  they  believe  in 
Christ  without  a  knowledge  of  the  word  which 
reveals  him.  "  How  can  they  believe  in  him 
of  whom  they  have  not  heard  ?"  As  the  lan- 
guages in  which  the  Scriptures  were  written 
ceased  to  be  spoken,  the  call  for  a  transla- 
tion of  them  into  the  vulgar  tongue  became 
imperative.  Translations,  however,  required 
great  labour  and  great  erudition.  A  copy  of 
the  Bible,  fully  written  out,  would  require  ten 
months  of  close  application ;  and  such  a  copy 
would  cost  the  yearly  stipend  of  a  curate.  A 
few  verses,  chapters,  or  sometimes  one  or 
more  of  the  epistles,  were  translated,  and 
were  sparsely  circulated.  They  were  pos- 
sessed by  but  few;  and  but  a  very  small  num- 

213 


214      ISHMAEL  AND  THE  CHURCH. 

ber  of  persons  in  the  whole  world  knew  of  the 
existence  of  any  other  Scriptures  than  these. 

Luther,  at  the  age  of  twenty,  had  never 
seen  or  heard  of  a  Bible.  His  discovery  of  it 
finally  was  the  result  of  mere  curiosity.  In 
examining  the  title-pages  of  old  volumes  in 
the  library  at  Erfurth,  he  lighted  upon  the 
sacred  manuscript  for  the  first  time;  and 
from  this  circumstance  we  may  conclude  that 
at  that  time,  and  for  all  great  practical  ends, 
the  Bible  had  become  wholly  lost  to  the  world. 
It  was  buried  in  a  dead  language,  in  caverns 
in  the  interior  of  Asia,  in  the  solitary  cells  of 
convents,  or  on  the  remote  shelves  of  public 
institutions.  Most  of  those  who  had  access  to 
it  could  not  read  it;  and  hence  God's  chosen 
instrumentality,  made  indispensable  to  man's 
salvation,  had  been  taken  away,  and  the 
blessed  day-spring  was  hid  from  human  eyes. 

But  the  Scriptures  might  have  been  restored, 
— might  have  been  given  to  the  people, — had 
not  the  whole  world's  nominal  Christianity  re- 
sisted the  attempt, — and  that  in  all  places  and 
for  ages.  When  the  nations  were  angry  and 
closed  the  blessed  book  by  violence,  it  indeed 
required  an  angel's  mighty  hand  to  open  and 
to  restore  it. 

In  a.d.  1229  the   translations  of  the  Albi- 


THE   ART  OF   PRINTING.  215 

genses  were  condemned  and  cast  into  the 
flames.  These  afflicted  disciples  sought  to 
repair  their  infinite  loss  by  committing  the 
Scriptures  to  memory;  and  among  the  inhabit- 
ants of  the  valleys  this  became  common.  So- 
cieties among  the  young  were  formed  for 
this  purpose,  and  to  each  member  was  in- 
trusted a  portion  of  the  word  of  God,  which 
it  was  required  of  him  to  commit  and  recite 
perfectly. 

A  candidate  for  the  ministry  in  those  times 
was  not  sufficiently  qualified  to  preach  the 
gospel  while  as  yet  he  remained  unable  to 
recite  all  the  books  of  both  Testaments  from 
memory.  The  monks,  the  doctors  of  the  Sor- 
bonne,  St.  Bernard,  and  Keinerius  the  Inqui- 
sitor, take  special  notice  of  the  astonishing 
familiarity  of  the  Albigeois  with  the  Scrip- 
tures, and  attribute  their  vast  superiority  in 
debate  to  this  cause. 

Wicliffe's  translation,  made  one  hundred 
years  before  the  art  of  printing  was  dis- 
covered, was  violently  suppressed.  Any  per- 
son who  possessed  any  portion  of  Wicliffe's 
English  version  was  condemned  to  the  stake; 
and  many  suffered  martyrdom  for  no  other 
reason.  And,  though  the  true  church  sur- 
vived in  England  and  in  many  other  places, 


216  ISHMAEL  AND   THE   CHURCH. 

yet  she  barely  survived.  In  the  twelfth  cen- 
tury Innocent  III.,  by  the  tortures  of  the  In- 
quisition and  by  vast  and  merciless  armies, 
had  well-nigh  destroyed  the  last  remnant  of 
God's  elect ;  and,  but  for  the  wars  of  the  cross 
in  Asia  at  the  time,  the  fearful  consummation 
might  have  been  reached. 

No  loss  to  the  church  was  ever  so  calamitous 
as  the  loss  of  the  Bible.  When  the  Greek  lan- 
guage was  generally  spoken,  the  divine  with- 
drawal of  inspired  teachers  was  accompanied 
with  the  substitution  of  the  inspired  word, 
which  occupied  their  places  and  afforded  to 
all  its  sufficient  supply  of  saving  light;  but 
when  that  language  ceased  to  be  spoken  the 
church  perished  over  whole  countries.  She 
lost  the  Word,  and  with  it  expired  her  vi- 
tality. No  course,  then,  when  the  object  was 
her  total  extinction,  could  have  been  pursued 
that  promised  to  be  more  fatally  successful 
than  to  deprive  her  of  her  Bible.  It  was  a 
policy  well  understood  by  her  enemies,  and 
for  three  hundred  years  most  rigorously 
carried  out. 

From  the  twelfth  to  the  sixteenth  centuries, 
but  here  and  there  a  copy  escaped,  either  in 
England  or  on  the  continent,  the  espionage  of 
those  in  the  interests  or  in  the  pay  of  Rome. 


THE  ART   OF   PRINTING.  217 

Not  only  the  great  centres  of  the  world's 
gathered  life,  but  rural  districts,  mountain- 
gorges,  and  remote  villages,  were  alike  under 
the  argus  gaze  of  the  ever-watchful  Antichrist. 
And  when  the  least  indications  of  reviving 
piety  became  visible,  and  the  precious  volume 
began  to  distribute  its  healing  leaves,  the  In- 
quisitor was  at  once  abroad,  and  the  dungeon 
and  the  stake  proved  but  all  too  effective. 

The  true  church  seemed  to  lose  ultimately, 
in  rivers  of  blood  and  in  the  despairing  and 
secret  flight  of  the  remnant  of  her  children, 
all  that  she  had  ever  gained.  The  dead  told 
no  tales.  Her  very  history  vanished  in  the 
flames  that  consumed  her  martyrs.  It  is  now 
gathered  mainly  from  the  notes  of  Inquisitors. 
Rome  in  all  these  conflicts  was  ever  triumphant, 
and  ever  pointed  her  monitory  ringer  from  the 
eternal  hills  to  the  dungeon,  to  the  ra<ik,  to 
whole  regions  blackened  by  the  flames  she  had 
kindled  and  strewed  with  the  whitened  bones 
of  the  godly,  and  cried  to  the  scattered  rem- 
nant, "Who  comes  this  way,  let  him  behold 
and  fear  to  sin!" 

Such  had  ever  been  the  result  until  the  com- 
mencement of  the    sixteenth  century.      The 
church  survived ;  but  it  was  amid  the  solitudes 
of  deserts  or  in  uninhabitable  mountains.     In 
19  o 


218  ISID1AEL    AND   THE    CHURCH. 

these  wild  coverts  of  the  tiger  and  the  wolf 
she  sat  in  sackcloth,  now  singing  her  hymn 
of  praise,  now  surprised  by  the  Dragoon  that 
hunted  her  life,  and  now  bowing  her  head  in 
her  spirit's  desolation. 

And,  but  for  the  discovery  of  the  art  of 
printing,  the  Reformation  of  the  sixteenth 
century  must  have  shared  the  fate  of  those 
that  had  preceded  it.  "  Oh !"  exclaimed 
Tyndale,  "while  I  am  sowing  in  one  place 
they  ravage  the  field  I  have  just  left.  I  can- 
not be  everywhere.  If  Christians  had  the 
Scriptures  in  their  own  tongue,  they  could 
themselves  withstand  these  sophists.  With- 
out the  Bible,  it  is  impossible  to  establish  the 
lait}^  in  the  truth." 

Twenty-two  years  after  the  martyrdom  of 
Huss,  while  Rome  was  meditating  a  subjuga- 
tion of  the  Greek  church  to  the  sovereign  pon- 
tiff, Laurentius  Custos  was  engaged,  in  the 
neighbourhood  of  Harlem,  in  cutting  his  name 
in  raised  letters  on  the  bark  of  a  birch-tree. 
He  amused  himself  by  reproducing  copies,  at 
his  pleasure,  with  these  rude  types,  and  finally 
began  to  print  on  a  larger  scale.  While  per- 
fecting his  newly-discovered  art,  his  servant 
(he  relates)  stole  his  types  and  tools  and  fled 
to  Mentz. 


THE   ART   OF   PRINTING.  219 

Iii  the  latter  place,  in  A.D.  1442,  a  company 
of  printers,  aided  by  John  Faustus,  a  wealthy 
citizen,  began  to  print  with  wooden  and  after- 
ward with  metallic  types.  It  is  said  that  the 
first  book  they  printed  was  a  Bible,  and  that 
they  completed  the  task  in  eight  years.  The 
company  kept  their  art  a  profound  secret. 
They  were  mutually  bound,  under  oath,  not 
to  reveal  their  great  and  lucrative  discovery. 
But,  in  a.d.  1468,  Mentz  was  stormed  and 
sacked  by  Adolphus,  Archbishop  of  Nassau, 
and,  the  printers  having  fled  into  different 
countries,  each  set  up  for  himself  a  printing- 
establishment.  The  art  ceased  any  longer 
to  be  a  secret.  In  1530,  when  Tyndale 
and  Luther  were  issuing  their  Bibles,  there 
were  two  hundred  presses  in  operation  in 
Europe. 

The  first  translation  of  the  Scriptures  into 
English,  directly  from  the  original,  was  made 
by  William  Tyndale :  (that  made  by  Wicliffe 
was  translated  from  the  Latin.)  Tyndale 
rose  in  England  simultaneously  with  Luther 
in  Germany.  Unable  to  proceed  with  his 
great  work  at  home,  he  in  1524  visited 
Luther,  and  in  less  than  two  years  succeeded 
in  printing  three  thousand  copies  of  his  ver- 
sion.    Shortly  after  numerous  copies  reached 


220  ISHMAEL  AND   THE    CHURCH. 

England,  and  were  diligently  though  secretly 
circulated. 

Bishop  Tonstall  condemned  "  this  most  pes- 
tiferous and  most  pernicious  poison  of  Tyn- 
dale,"  and  prohibited  its  use.  Many  of  the 
people  were  imprisoned  and  many  of  the 
books  publicly  burned.  But  the  destruction 
of  the  copies  in  England  encouraged  the 
Dutch  to  resupply  a  market  in  which  they 
were  in  such  demand.  Their  sales  were  rapid 
and  their  profits  enormous.  Tonstall,  to  arrest 
the  evil  in  its  source,  went  to  Antwerp  and 
bought  up  all  the  copies  he  could  obtain. 
These  were  all  committed  to  the  flames  in  St. 
Paul's  churchyard  by  the  zealous  bishop.  He 
was  not  aware  that  printing  was  such  a  pro- 
lific source  of  reproduction,  and  was  amazed 
that  the  Dutch  had  another  edition,  shortly 
after,  ready  for  the  English  market,  desiring 
to  sell  the  books,  not  caring  whether  they  were 
read  or  burned. 

Archbishop  Warham  also  assembled  a  con- 
vention, (a.d.  1530,)  and  sought  to  close  the 
open  book.  The  good  people  were  called  upon 
"  to  detest  and  abhor  the  New  Testament 
printed  in  English,"  and  to  deliver  up  all  the 
copies  in  their  possession  to  the  proper  authori- 
ties.     Ah   me!    how  many  in  that  day  gave 


THE   ART   OF    PRINTING.  221 

liberty  and  life  itself  away  in  their  zeal  for  the 
diffusion  of  the  Holy  Scriptures  !  "  To  see," 
says  Fox,  "their  travails,  their  earnest  seek- 
ing, their  burning  zeal,  their  readings,  their 
watchings,  their  secret  assemblies,  their  love 
and  concord,  their  godly  living,  their  faithful 
marrying  with  the  faithful,  may  make  us  now, 
in  these  our  days  of  free  profession,  to  blush 
for  shame." 

Tyndale's  Bible  survived  the  martyr.  He, 
while  prosecuting  with  ardour  his  great  work, 
was  arrested  at  Antwerp  and  strangled  for  the 
crime  of  heresy.  His  last  prayer  was  for  his 
country,  and  especially  that  the  Lord  would 
open  the  eyes  of  the  king  of  England.  In  that 
same  year  Henry  gave  the  Bible  to  the  people. 

19* 


CHAPTER  XXVIII. 

THE    ART   OF    PRINTING   AND   THE    REFORMATION. 

"  Howl,  winds  of  night !  your  force  combine  : 
Without  His  high  behest 
Ye  shall  not,  in  the  mountain-pine, 
Disturb  the  sparrow's  nest." 

Kirke  White. 

We  now  turn  to  Germany,  not  for  the  pur- 
pose of  following  up  the  thrilling  history  of 
Luther,  not  to  survey  the  colossal  proportions 
of  his  massive  intellect,  not  to  observe  his 
courage  amid  perils,  his  hairbreadth  escapes, 
his  triumphs  over  Dr.  Eck,  Cardinal  Cajetan, 
and  the  learned  Erasmus,  but  to  look  in  upon 
him  in  his  prison  at  the  Wartburg,  in  which, 
because  he  has  nothing  now  to  excite  and  em- 
ploy his  active  mind  and  to  turn  him  off  from 
his  great  work,  he  finishes  the  translation  of 
the  New  Testament  into  the  German. 

This,  to  use  his  own  sententious  words,  was 
to  bring  forth  "the  sun  whence  all  teachers 
receive  their  light."  This,  the  greatest  and 
most  effective  of  all  the  works  of  the  ill  us- 


THE    ART   OF    PRINTING.  223 

trious  Keformer,  was  finished  in  the  summer 
of  1521.  Before  Tyndale  and  Luther  knew 
each  other,  the  same  blessed  Spirit  had  em- 
ployed them  both,  in  different  countries  and 
in  different  languages,  in  the  consummation 
of  the  same  difficult  and  momentous  task. 
Shortly  after,  they  met  at  Antwerp,  and  their 
versions  were  issued  very  nearly  at  the  same 
time. 

But  for  this, — but  for  the  numerous  copies 
of  the  living  word  put  in  circulation  by  the  Re- 
formers,— like  Waldo,  Wicliffe,  and  Huss,  they 
also  and  their  works  would  have  perished 
with  their  own  living  age.  But,  when  the 
Scriptures  in  the  vulgar  tongue  became  the 
basis  of  the  Reformation,  the  Reformation  it- 
self, despite  an  occasional  winter,  became  pe- 
rennial as  the  verdure  which  returning  spring 
ever  renews  and  freshens  on  the  martyr's 
grave. 

The  book  thus  opened  in  Germany  led  the 
alarmed  enemies  of  reform  to  insist  renewedly 
and  peremptorily  on  the  execution  of  the  sen- 
tence against  Luther  and  his  Bible.  "  I  say," 
said  the  Papal  legate  to  the  Diet  at  Nurem- 
berg, "  on  this  point  as  I  do  of  the  rest.  The 
sentences  of  the  pope  and  the  emperor  ought 
to  be  implicitly  obeyed;  the  books  should  be 


224  ISHMAEL   AND    THE    CHURCH. 

burned,  and  the  printers  and  vendors  of  them 
duly  punished.  There  is  no  other  way  to 
suppress  and  extinguish  this  pernicious  sect. 
It  is  from  the  reading  of  their  books  that  all 
these  evils  have  arisen,"*  "The  flames  of 
their  treason,"  says  Pallavicini,  "are  not  to 
be  extinguished  by  concessions,  but  quenched 
by  showers  of  blood. "f 

George,  Duke  of  Saxony,  armed  with  In- 
quisitorial and  Papal  authority,  sought  to 
carry  out  these  cruel  policies,  and  for  this  pur- 
pose purchased  and  destroyed  all  the  copies 
of  the  Testament  in  German  he  could  obtain, 
severely  punishing  at  the  same  time  those  of 
his  subjects  who  refused  to  deliver  them  up. 
His  kingdom  resounded  with  anathemas  against 
the  Eeformers,  falling  in  bitterness  from  priestly 
lips,  and  with  the  uproar  of  persecution. 

But  the  press  astonished  and  confounded  the 
foes  of  truth.  It  restored  the  lost  copies  of 
the  inspired  word,  and  oppression  roused  an 
interest  that  gentleness  would  have  left  dor- 
mant. The  Bible  was  sought  out  and  read 
among  all  classes  with  unprecedented  avidity, 
and  what  the  living  teacher,  without  it,  was 
unable  to  do,  the  word  did  for  him: — It  in  ten 


*  Millner,  chap.  xvi.  f  Ibid. 


THE  ART   OF  PRINTING.  225 

thousand  dwellings  became  a  burning  and  an 
inextinguishable  light,  whether  that  teacher 
were  abroad  or  whether  he  slept  in  the 
prison  or  the  grave.  "It  is  not  I,  I  repeat 
it,  it  is  the  divine  word,  which  has  done  every 
thing."* 

In  the  days  of  the  apostles,  the  inspiration 
of  numerous  teachers  gave  the  church  her 
vantage-ground.  Her  ministry  was  a  living 
word, — an  epistle  read  of  all.  But  when  un- 
inspired men  succeeded  to  them,  and  the  book 
which  they  left  behind  became  itself  sealed 
up  in  the  silence  and  darkness  of  a  dead  lan- 
guage, the  teachers  which  appealed  to  it  as 
umpire  in  every  debated  point  openly  admitted 
their  own  liability  to  err,  and  sunk  at  once  out 
of  sight  as  ultimate  authority  whenever  that 
book  was  referred  to.  Not  so  the  Papal  eccle- 
siastic. He  claimed  infallibility  for  his  church, 
and  for  himself,  as  the  authorized  and  ultimate 
interpreter  of  its  faith. 

The  Protestant,  following  the  impulses  of  a 
better  age,  exalted  against  the  infallibility  of 
the  church  the  infallibility  of  the  evangelists, 
and  against  the  infallibility  of  the  priest  the 
infallibility  of  the  Holy  Spirit.     The  rage  of 

*  Millner,  ch.  xvi. 


226  ISHMAEL  AND   THE   CHURCH, 

Home,  therefore,  at  this  time  fell  most  severely 
upon  the  Scriptures  in  the  vulgar  tongue,  and 
on  what  was  termed  by  them  "  private  inter- 
pretation." The  issue  was  in  reality  between 
the  open  Bible  in  the  angel's  hand  and  Home. 
And  the  conflict  that  now  arose  became  one  of 
new,  peculiar,  and  of  overmastering  difficulty. 

Before  the  art  of  printing  was  discovered, 
the  dungeon  and  the  fagot  in  a  few  short 
years  laid  the  rising  Keformation  low;  now 
the  living  teacher  might  perish  from  among 
men,  but  Bibles  and  Testaments  fell  like  the 
dew,  silently  and  secretly,  in  multiplied  edi- 
tions and  copies,  everywhere.  They  were  on 
the  departed  Inquisitors  track  while  yet  it  was 
warm ;  or,  while  he  snatched  the  copy  from  the 
shelf  of  the  peasant  and  cast  it  into  the  fire, 
its  fellow  slept  securely  under  the  hearth- 
stone. When  the  living  teacher  fell,  his  elo- 
quent appeals  were  cut  short  forever.  The 
mighty  champion  had  but  one  life,  and  one 
blow  ended  it.  But,  when  he  added  the  press 
to  the  pulpit,  he  reproduced  himself  in  ten 
thousand  lives;  depositing  these  in  the  safe- 
keeping of  numerous  individuals,  families,  and 
kingdoms. 

We  may  well  smile  in  this  day  at  the  Pope's 
bull  against  Bible  societies.      Will  he  spread 


THE  ART   OF    PRINTING.  227 

his  scarlet  robe  on  the  broad  mountains  and 
absorb  all  the  dews  of  heaven  in  its  tiny  folds? 
Will  he  put  up  his  little  palm  and  expect  to 
quench  in  it  the  light  of  day  ?  0  thou  impo- 
tent and  impious  one!  "God  shall  destroy 
thee.  He  shall  take  thee  away.  He  shall 
pluck  thee  out  of  thy  dwelling-place  and  root 
thee  out  of  the  land  of  the  living.  The  right- 
eous also  shall  see  and  shall  fear  and  shall 
laugh  at  him.  Lo,  this  is  the  man  that  made 
not  God  his  strength,  but  strengthened  himself 
in  his  wickedness." 

Papal  infallibility  resolves  itself  ultimately 
into  the  infallibility  of  every  individual  mem- 
ber of  its  priesthood.  It  was  an  after-thought, 
the  result  of  a  peculiar  necessity.  Perplexed 
individuals  were  required  to  go  to  them,  and 
not  to  depend  upon  the  guidance  of  their  own 
erring  minds. 

"The  sacred  writings,"  said  Erasmus,  "are  an 
abyss  in  whose  depths  even  the  most  learned 
men  have  often  been  lost The  Scrip- 
tures are  committed  to  the  learned,  and  to 
them  only."  Such  were  the  assumptions  which 
wrere,  in  the  new  circumstances  of  the  contend- 
ing parties,  resorted  to  to  close  again  the  now 
open  book.  Since  it  could  not  be  destroyed 
by  fire,  it  might  be  by  construction.     If  its  in- 


228  ISHMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

terpretation  must  ever  be  derived  from  the 
priesthood,  Rome  would,  after  all  her  fears, 
lose  nothing  by  a  translation.  The  Bible 
would  be  quite  as  effectually  sealed  in  such 
an  event  as  though  it  still  had  slept  in  the 
unbroken  repose  of  an  unknown  tongue. 

It  was,  however,  opened  as  an  authoritative 
record  in  two  respects.  In  the  first  it  was 
opened  in  a  translation ;  in  the  second,  to  the 
understandings  of  men  by  the  Holy  Spirit. 
The  author  of  the  Bible  should  understand  his 
own  meaning  best,  and  had  promised  illumina- 
tion to  the  sincere  suppliant.  "The  sacred 
writings  are  not  to  be  understood  but  by  that 
Spirit  with  which  they  were  written ;  which 
Spirit  is  never  felt  to  be  more  powerful  and 
energetic  than  when  he  attends  the  serious 
perusal  of  the  writings  which  he  himself  dic- 
tated."* 

The  alternative  presented  thus  by  the  Pro- 
testant was  not  that  of  a  selection  of  a  Papal 
or  a  Protestant  for  a  guide.  The  latter  aban- 
doned, at  once  and  forever,  the  awful  arena 
into  which  he  had  been  challenged  by  his 
Papal  antagonist,  and  elevated  in  his  place 
the  Holy  Spirit,  to  take  charge  of  the  per- 

*  Millner,  vol.  ii.  p.  286. 


THE   ART   OF  PRINTING.  229 

plexities  of  every  mind,  and  to  open  the  mean- 
ing of  His  own  word  to  every  humble  and 
earnest  inquirer  after  truth. 

"  However  blameless  a  life  I  might  lead  as  a 
monk,"  said  Luther,  "I  experienced  a  most 
unquiet  conscience.  I  perceived  myself  a  sin- 
ner before  God.  I  saw  that  I  could  do  nothing 
to  appease  him,  and  I  hated  the  idea  of  a  just 
God  that  punished  sinners.  I  was  well  versed 
in  all  St.  Paul's  writings,  and,  in  particular,  I 
had  a  most  wonderful  desire  to  understand  the 
Epistle  to  the  Romans.  But  I  was  puzzled 
with  the  expression,  'Therein  is  the  right- 
eousness of  God  revealed.'  My  heart  rose 
almost  against  God  with  a  silent  sort  of  blas- 
phemy  Over  and  over  I  turned  the 

above-mentioned  passage  to  the  Eomans  most 
importunately.  My  thirst  to  know  the  apostle's 
meaning  was  insatiable. 

"  At  length,  while  I  was  meditating  day  and 
night  on  the  words  and  their  connection  with 
what  immediately  follows, — namely,  'The 
just  shall  live  by  faith,' — it  pleased  God  to 
have  pity  upon  me,  to  open  my  eyes  and  to 
show  me  that  'the  righteousness  of  God/ 
which  is  here  said  in  the  gospel  to  be  revealed 
from  faith  to  faith,  relates  to  the  method  by 
which   God   in   his   mercy  justifies  a  sinner 

20 


230  ISHMAEL   AND   THE  CHURCH. 

through  faith Hence  I  felt  myself  a 

new  man,  and  all  the  Scriptures  appeared  to 

have   a   new   face This   very   passage 

of  St.  Paul  proved  to  me  the  entrance  into 
paradise."* 

The  Waldensos,  the  Wicliffites,  the  Hussites, 
the  Lutherans,  the  Calvinists,  the  true  church 
in  every  age,  from  the  earliest  times,  obtained 
her  light  from  above,  and  sought  not  an  in- 
fallible but  a  converted  ministry,  whose  un- 
derstandings Jesus  had  opened  that  they 
should  understand  the  Scriptures.  In  deter- 
mining whether  teachers  were  true  or  false, 
how  did  the  church  "  sift  their  private  spirit, 
whether  they  had  experienced  any  internal 
distress  of  soul,  the  attacks  of  death  and  hell, 
and  the  comforts  of  the  new  birth  unto  right- 
eousness" !  "  If,"  runs  the  instructions,  "  you 
hear  nothing  from  them  but  smooth,  tranquil, 
and,  forsooth,  what  they  call  devout,  religious 
contemplations,  regard  them  not."f 

The  opening  of  the  Scriptures  in  a  transla- 
tion made  them  accessible  to  the  people.  But 
they  saw  not  to  the  end  of  that  which  was 
abolished.  The  same  veil  that  blinded  the 
Jew  obscured  the  vision  of  the  Gentile.      He 

*  Millner,  vol.  ii.  p.  232.  f  Ibid.  p.  342. 


TUE   ART   OF    PRINTING.  Zol 

too  stood  before  the  burning  mount,  and, 
though  he  had  heard  of  Jesus,  yet  to  him 
also,  until  divinely  enlightened,  his  Lord  re- 
mained entombed  underneath  the  ministration 
of  death. 

The  Keformation  of  the  sixteenth  century 
was  a  revival  of  spiritual  life  in  the  kingdoms 
of  the  West.  This  was  the  mainspring  of  its 
power;  and  by  it  the  translated  Scriptures  be- 
came a  lamp  to  the  feet  and  a  light  to  the  path 
of  lost  nations.  Omit  this  most  essential  part 
of  the  vision,  and  God's  great  work  is  effectu- 
ally hid  from  our  eyes. 

The  well-known  symbol  of  a  Papal  church 
is  a  cross.  It  is  the  universal  sign  of  her  faith, 
whether  made  by  the  printer,  the  goldsmith 
or  carpenter,  whether  stamped  on  a  book,  or 
worn  on  the  breast,  or  elevated  on  the  tops  of 
churches.  But  it  is  not  a  more  universal  badge 
of  Komanism  than  is  an  open  Bible  that  of 
Protestantism. 

The  Bible  was  never  opened  to  any  con- 
siderable extent,  as  we  have  seen,  until  it 
assumed  the  form  of  a  printed  book.  And,  as 
the  effort  to  close  it  again  and  the  effort  to 
keep  it  open  has  made  it  the  centre  of  debate 
among  civilized  nations  for  three  centuries,  it 
has  become,    providentially,    the   well-known 


232  ISIIMAEL   AND    THE    CHUKCII. 

sign  of  the  Protestant  religion.  The  printer, 
the  carpenter,  and  the  gilder,  are  alike  em- 
ployed to  supply  the  recognised  symbol  of  a 
Protestant  Christianity  by  those  who  would 
represent  a  Reformer  or  a  modern  clergyman, 
or  characterize  a  book  by  a  sign  on  its  cover, 
or  a  Bible  society  by  a  sign  at  its  door. 

From  the  time  in  which  in  England  the 
Bible  was  fastened  to  a  desk  in  the  centre  of 
a  library  for  public  use,  because  the  demand 
exceeded  the  supply,  until  this  day,  when  it  is 
offered  gratuitously  to  all,  it  has  ever  been  the 
striking  and  significant  emblem  of  our  Pro- 
testant faith.  And  while  Rome  continues  to 
elevate  her  cross  and  to  condemn  the  Bible  to 
the  flames,  so  long  will  the  picture  of  an  open 
book  in  the  hand  of  an  angel,  or  in  the  hand 
of  a  martyr  or  a  minister,  distinguish  the 
friends  of  the  Bible  from  its  foes  and  point 
them  out  as  the  irreconcilable  enemies  of 
darkness  and  of  Rome. 

And  who  can  fail  to  see,  in  that  halo  round 
about  the  head  of  the  cloud-robed  angel*  of 
the  Reformation,  the  token  of  mercy?  It  is 
here  at  this  point  in  earth's  sad  history, — on 
this  Ararat  where    the    ark  finally  rested, — 

*  Revelation  x.  1. 


THE   ART   OF   PRINTING.  233 

that  we  look  out  on  plats  of  living  verdure 
which  here  and  there  dot  the  desolate  ex- 
panse, and  which  are  seen  amid  the  remaining 
and  angry  surges  of  the  receding  flood.  And 
while  the  mournful  experience  of  the  past 
fills  us  with  anxiety  for  the  future,  the  bow  is 
seen  in  the  cloud,  and  the  face  of  the  angel 
that  holds  the  little  book  in  his  right  hand 
shines  through  the  tears  of  a  tempest  now 
passing  away.  And  we  assuredly  gather,  from 
that  emblem,  that  that  blessed  book  shall  not  be 
again  closed,  until  the  heavens  themselves 
shall  be  rolled  together  as  a  scroll,  and  the 
earth  with  the  things  that  are  therein  shall  be 
burned  up. 

20*  p 


CHAPTER  XXIX. 

THE   DISCOVERY   OF   AMERICA,    AND   THE 
REFORMATION. 

Thy  foot  Lath  left  upon  the  sea 

A  glimmering  path  to  guide  our  flight ; 

But  where  proud  Rome  pursues  our  way- 
It  turns  the  day-spring  into  night. 

The  right  foot  of  the  angel  of  the  great  Re- 
formation was  in  the  sea.  His  most  auspicious 
outgoings  were  to  be  in  connection  with  its 
turbulent  waves.  Thus  is  it  intimated  that  a 
pillar  of  fire,  to  guide  the  church  amid  many 
dark  and  disastrous  providences,  should  cast 
its  light  across  the  ocean  and  invite  her  perse- 
cuted children  to  seek  an  asylum  on  the  shores 
of  a  distant  continent. 

Two  short  years  after  the  storming  of  Mentz 
and  the  consequent  dispersion  of  its  secret 
conclave  of  printers,  the  same  Providence 
which  had  in  this  wonderful  manner  originated 
printing-presses  simultaneously  in  the  different 
countries   of   Europe   brought   to  Lisbon   the 

234 


AMERICA.  235 

son  of  a  wool-comber, — a  youth  of  most  re- 
markable genius  and  invention,  and  who,  ob- 
taining the  command  of  vessels  for  the  pur- 
pose, undertook  the  discovery  of  an  unknown 
coast. 

In  a.d.  1492,  Columbus  reached  the  West 
Indies,  and  shortly  after  the  Western  continent 
became  known  to  Europe.  Numerous  adven- 
turers hastened  to  its  shores  in  successive  voy- 
ages and  in  a  fruitless  quest  of  wealth  and  do- 
minion. The  mariner's  compass  and  the  art 
of  ship-building  and  navigation,  however,  be- 
came by  these  means  gradually  perfected,  and 
the  great  end  of  Providence,  in  its  mighty  foot- 
print in  the  sea,  came  in  a  few  short  years  to 
be  realized. 

Hitherto  the  emigration  of  nomadic  tribes, 
the  wanderings  of  the  persecuted,  or  the  travels 
of  merchants,  had  been  by  land.  A  few  islands 
clotting  the  Atlantic  coast  of  Europe  had  been 
reached;  the  Mediterranean,  the  Black  Sea,  and 
the  British  Channel,  and  a  few  other  inland 
basins,  had  been  coasted  and  crossed ;  but  these 
were  short  voyages,  made  long  before  by  the 
Egyptians,  the  Phenicians,  the  Babylonians, 
the  Greeks,  and  the  Romans,  and  their  repe- 
tition could  make  no  new  or  considerable  im- 
pressions on  the  fortunes  of  the  race, — could 


236  ISHMAEL   AND   THE  CHURCH. 

not  be  referred  to  as  forming  a  grand  epoch  in 
the  world's  eventful  history,  and  be  consist- 
ently represented  by  the  descent  of  an  angel 
from  heaven  throwing  with  his  right  foot,  and 
for  the  first  time  since  the  days  of  John,  a 
luminous  track  across  the  sea. 

But  when  America  was  discovered, — when 
the  Western  continent  opened  its  bosom  to  the 
refugees  from  the  Old  World  and  threw  a  wide 
ocean  between  them  and  their  oppressors, — this 
became  a  great  event,  and  must  in  all  time  be 
chronicled  as  such.  There  originated  then, 
on  that  far-off  and  protected  coast,  a  mighty 
nationality  under  the  sway  of  the  little  book 
in  the  angel's  hand.  Thousands,  finding  that 
they  could  not  enjoy  its  chartered  rights  and 
walk  by  its  laws  of  salvation  under  the  frown- 
ing battlements  of  Borne,  to  escape  the  stake 
and  win  their  freedom  fled  to  the  sea,  to  join 
the  new  commonwealth  opening  its  gates  to- 
ward the  setting  of  the  sun. 

It  was  in  this  manner  that  its  most  desirable 
acquisitions  were  made.  Persecution  in  the 
Old  World  drove  successive  companies  of  weep- 
ing disciples  into  the  sea  to  form  and  to  defend 
the  Western  states.  It,  more  than  all  other 
causes  put  together,  originated  the  great  Be- 
public. 


AMEEICA.  237 

The  aslies  of  Huss  found  their  way  to  the 
sea.  Those  of  Wicliffe  were  thrown  into  the 
Swift.  "It/!  says  Fuller,  " conveyed  them 
into  Avon,  Avon  into  Severn,  Severn  into  the 
narrow  seas,  they  into  the  main  ocean;  and 
thus  the  ashes  of  Wicliffe  are  the  emblem  of 
his  doctrine,  which  now  is  dispersed  all  the 
world  over." 

Into  that  sea,  which  shall  yet  yield  up  its 
tears  and  its  dead,  the  angel  placed  his  foot. 
There  were  the  outgoings  of  his  most  illus- 
trious providences ;  there  was  the  bow  of  pro- 
mise round  about  his  head ;  and,  though  painted 
on  a  nebula  of  tears,  it  assured  the  pilgrim  that 
the  storm  had  passed  away. 

The  early  settlements  of  interested  adven- 
turers in  the  New  World,  in  pursuit  of  gold 
and  gems,  ended  in  disappointment  and  dis- 
aster. The  ruins  of  colonial  villages,  and  the 
bones  that  were  strewed  upon  the  clearings  of 
the  wilderness,  startled  and  discouraged  those 
that  succeeded  such  unfortunate  pioneers. 
They  looked  in  terror  upon  the  ashes  of  their 
huts  and  the  trail  of  blood  where  the  plough 
stood  in  the  half-finished  furrow  of  the  corn- 
field, and  turned  away  in  despair. 

But,  when  the  persecuted  fled  successively 
to  the  sea  on  a  religious  account,  the  settle- 


238  ISHMAEL   AND   TIIE    CHURCH. 

ments  became  permanent,  and  grew  ultimately 
into  flourishing  states.  Their  ships  were  pi- 
loted by  an  unseen  intelligence,  and  landed 
their  precious  freights  at  the  most  desirable 
points.  Toward  them  the  angel  ever  turned 
his  bright  face  and  the  bright  side  of  the  efful- 
gent pillar. 

Their  favoured  emigrations  stand  ever  in 
striking  contrast  with  those  of  a  pursuing 
Rome.  From  her  unblessed  and  sinister  track 
the  face  of  the  angel  was  ever  averted ;  and 
the  dark  side  of  the  fiery  pillar  cast  a  cheer- 
less shadow  over  her  missions  and  fortunes. 

Every  step  with  her  has  proved  a  mistake. 
Her  earlier  and  most  numerous  converts  in  the 
New  World  were  its  aborigines, — a  fated  race, 
that  have  already  descended  into  the  tomb 
opened  for  them  by  the  hand  of  a  higher  and 
a  holier  civilization. 

Her  conquests  also  in  South  America  and 
the  West  Indies  are  now  within  the  eddies  of 
a  mightier  and  a  more  absorbing  attraction ; 
and  her  immigrant  millions,  scattered  through 
the  North,  surrounded  by  the  nobler  manhood 
and  superior  intelligence  of  Protestant  com- 
munities, have  failed  to  close  the  little  book  in 
the  angel's  hand,  or  even  to  preserve  them- 
selves from  its  mysterious  sway. 


AMERICA.  239 

Hers  is  a  failing  struggle.  And  it  is  ob- 
viously the  destiny  of  the  swaggering  and 
wrinkled  harlot  to  waste  away  and  perish 
amid  institutions  and  influences  whose  powers 
of  assimilation  are  steady,  expansive,  and  irre- 
sistible. While  in  Europe,  during  the  same 
period,  she  has  won  back  most  of  her  lost  ter- 
ritory and  power,  in  America  she  mourns  the 
loss  of  most  of  her  treasures  and  her  children. 

The  future  of  this  goodly  land  is  also  full 
of  hopeful  intimations.  The  nature  and  ne- 
cessary tendency  of  the  mighty  causes  which 
now  already  exist  seem  destined  to  make  the 
new  continent  the  perpetual  home  of  a  vast 
and  a  happy  Protestant  nationality.  The  de- 
lightful experience  of  the  past,  and  the  bow 
of  promise  encircling  the  angel's  brow  with  its 
halo  of  attractive  benignity,  assure  us  that 
those  pilgrims  who  fled  to  the  sea  took  the 
propitious  track,  reached  the  summit  of  safety 
where  the  ark  rested,  and  from  the  tops  of 
their  Alleghanies  we  look  back  over  perilous 
and  assuaged  deeps,  and  recount  on  the  historic 
page  the  devastations  of  a  deluge  whose  angry 
surges  can  never  reach  us  more. 


CHAPTER  XXX. 

ISLAMISM   AND   THE   REFORMATION". 

"  The  ocean  eagle  soar'd 
From  his  nest  by  the  white  waves'  foam, 
And  the  rocking  pines  of  the  forest  roar'd : 
This  was  their  welcome  home  !" 

We  how  turn  from  the  sea, — that  strik- 
ing emblem  of  the  church,  of  her  unsettled 
and  changeful  state,  of  her  stormy  doom, 
of  the  crude  and  troubled  elements  out  of 
which  she  was  to  construct  for  herself  her 
home  in  the  New  World, — to  the  land  where 
society  still  continued  to  repose  in  the  midst 
of  mediaeval  dynasties,  and,  as  the  normal 
law  of  its  safety,  undesirous  and  resistful  of 
change. 

Well  might  the  angel  place  his  left  foot  on 
a  spot  so  unpropitious,  where  improvement 
would  be  sure  to  be  opposed,  and  new  though 
right  opinions  be  made  treason  against  princes 
and  impiety  in  the  church. 

In  the    New  World   the  church  found  all 

240 


EUROPE.  241 

social  circumstances  appropriate  or  controllable, 
and  ultimately  congenial.  She  had  but  to  rise 
there  upon  the  broad  and  sufficient  foundation 
of  her  open  book  and  her  blessed  testimony. 
She  had  no  one  there  to  spy  out  her  liberty, 
or  embarrass  or  retard  the  natural  outwork- 
ings  of  her  inward  life. 

But,  in  the  Old,  both  church  and  state  fell 
back  on  the  iron  forms  of  past  mistakes;  and 
long-cherished  errors,  hallowed  by  time  and 
endorsed  by  custom,  yielded  slowly,  reluct- 
antly, and  often  but  partially,  to  the  progress 
of  the  Reformation.  Yea,  many  of  the  Re- 
formers needed  themselves  to  be  reformed, — 
needed  all  the  treason,  cruelty,  and  persecution 
that  pursued  them  to  prevent  their  fatal  con- 
cessions to  Rome,  or,  perhaps,  their  return  to 
her  bosom. 

Leo's  bull,  and  the  harsh  treatment  received 
by  Luther  at  Worms,  proved  a  blessing.  It 
insulted  his  generous  though  impulsive  na- 
ture, and  awakened  an  opposition  which  a 
more  gentle  course  might  have  modified  or 
neutralized.  And  yet,  with  all  that  tended 
to  isolate  and  freely  develop  the  church,  Ge- 
neva, the  British  Islands,  and  Holland,  became 
finally  the  prominent  centres  of  a  reformation 
that  had  halted  sadly  in  other  places. 


242  ISHMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

Luther  could  scarcely  ever  be  himself. 
Erasmus,  at  the  first,  preached  to  him  mo- 
deration. Melancthon  also,  and  the  Protest- 
ant princes,  were  ever  ready  to  instruct  his 
caution  and  to  restrain  the  free  outworkings 
of  his  evangelical  spirit.  With  a  nature  so  im- 
pressible and  social,  and  ever  listening  to  the 
counsels  of  the  worldly-wise  or  the  spiritually 
timid,  it  is  truly  wonderful  that  he  at  length 
broke  through  so  many  restraints  and  put  so 
wide  a  separation  between  himself  and  Home. 

Zuingle,  Calvin,  and  Knox,  were  farther 
from  the  focus  of  such  influences;  and  the 
church  under  their  auspices  became  more 
thoroughly  reformed,  rose  to  a  purer  evangel- 
ism. But  in  no  country  did  she  rise  as  she 
did  when  the  ocean  rolled  between  her  and 
the  Old  World. 

The  struggles  of  the  non-conformists  and  the 
recent  exodus  of  the  Free  Church  of  Scotland 
are  examples  which  show  the  tendency  of  the 
church  toward  a  more  scriptural  form  and  a 
freer  ecclesiasticism  than  she  had  ever  attained 
under  her  transatlantic  surroundings. 

The  Protestantism  of  Germany  also,  unlike 
that  of  the  United  States,  trembled  often  on 
the  very  verge  of  ruin,  and  gained  at  last  for 
herself  a  precarious  footing,  not  by  a  natural 


EUROPE.  243 

development  of  her  own  principles  and  power, 
but  by  a  wonderful  intervention,*  temporary 
in  its  influence,  whose  aid  was  an  indirection 
of  Providence,  and  which,  having  subserved 
its  purpose,  would  pass  away. 

Thus,  in  a.d.  1530,  while  yet  in  its  infancy, 
it  was  well-nigh  strangled  in  its  cradle.  Papal 
and  imperial  foes,  having  united,  had  taken 
the  initiatory  steps  for  its  destruction.  The 
princes,  states,  and  cities  which  had  thrown 
off  the  papal  yoke  were  required  instantly  to 
return  to  their  duty  and  to  their  allegiance  to 
the  sovereign  pontiff,  on  pain  of  imperial  and 
papal  displeasure.  And,  but  for  the  sudden 
appearance  of  Solyman  in  great  force  thun- 
dering at  the  gates  of  the  empire,  the  Protest- 
ant cause,  in  Germany  at  least,  must  have 
been  ruined.  It  had  been  resolved  that  "  the 
flames  of  its  treason  could  not  be  extinguished 
by  concessions :  it  could  be  quenched  only  by 
showers  of  blood." 

In  the  United  States  it  sprang  up  peacefully, 
as  plants  spring  up  under  genial  skies.  In 
Germany  it  survived  an  impending  ruin  only 
amid  the  terrors  of  invasion  and  the  storms  of 
war. 

*  Invasions  by  the  Turks. 


244       ISHMAEL  AND  THE  CHURCH. 

Mosheim,  in  accounting  for  the  establish- 
ment of  Protestantism,  shows  it  to  have  been 
the  result  of  a  temporary  necessity,  a  com- 
promise for  the  present,  that  left  it  on  a  very 
insecure  basis : — "With  respect  to  the  emperor, 
various  reasons  united  to  turn  his  views  to- 
ward peace.  For,  on  the  one  hand,  he  stood 
in  need  of  succours  against  the  Turks,  which 
the  Protestant  princes  refused  to  grant  while 
the  edicts  of  Worms  and  Augsburg  remained 
in  force ;  .  .  .  .  and,  after  various  negotiations, 
a  treaty  of  peace  was  concluded  at  Nuremberg, 
a.d.  1532,  between  the  emperor  and  the  Protest- 
ant princes,  on  the  following  conditions  : — That 
the  latter  should  furnish  a  subsidy  for  carrying 
on  the  war  against  the  Turks,  and  acknowledge 
Ferdinand  as  lawful  king  of  the  Romans,"*  &c. 
Thus,  the  suspension  of  hostilities  was  the  re- 
sult of  a  stern  necessity, — the  brief  and  un- 
certain lull  of  the  volcano  whose  convulsions 
might  soon  become  still  more  terrible. 

In  a.d.  1542,  the  emperor  renewedly  disco- 
vered his  hostile  intentions  by  turning  against 
the  Elector  of  Cologne,  and  by  summoning  him 
to  answer  the  charges  to  be  preferred  against 
him.    In  the  mean  time,  in  the  Low  Countries, 

*  Mosheim,  vol.  ii.  p.  34. 


EUROPE.  245 

his  Protestant  subjects  were  persecuted  with 
unrelenting  severity.  At  Worms  he  silenced 
the  Protestant  ministers;  and,  that  he  might 
be  unembarrassed  by  the  Turks  in  his  efforts 
at  this  time  to  destroy  the  church,  he  sent 
overtures  of  peace  to  Constantinople. 

The  Council  of  Trent,  summoned  for  the 
same  sinister  purpose,  assembled,  and  com- 
menced its  deliberations, —  a  sanhedrim  of 
bigoted  and  fierce  ecclesiastics,  who  were 
again  to  deliver  Jesus  to  Pilate  to  be  cruci- 
fied. A  solemn  protestation  against  a  council, 
called  solely  by  the  Papal  authorities  and 
under  their  immediate  control,  was  without 
effect.  Its  sessions  began  in  a.d.  1546,  and  were 
in  secret;  but  enough  transpired  at  the  time  to 
make  it  patent  to  all  that  the  church  of  the 
book  was  to  be  destroyed,  and  that  on  a  sud- 
den a  blow  was  to  be  struck  that  should  at  once 
annihilate  the  Protestant  interest.  Charles, 
that  he  might  be  ready  to  enforce  its  expected 
decrees,  hastened  his  military  preparations. 

The  death  of  Luther  just  at  this  juncture — 
an  event  which  was  regarded  in  all  Papal 
circles  as  a  most  propitious  coincident — aug- 
mented the  gloom  that  hung  in  increasing 
darkness  over  the  Protestant  cause. 

A  decisive  battle,  fought  on  the  Elbe,  April 

21* 


246  ISHMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

24,  A.d.  1547,  completed  the  catastrophe.  The 
unhappy  confederates  fell  before  a  tact  and  a 
generalship  to  which  they  were  not  equal,  and 
were  placed  completely  at  the  mercy  of  a  foe 
bent  on  their  extermination.  Resist  they  could 
not.  Their  armies  were  subdued  and  their 
leaders  dispersed  or  in  captivity.  Supplica- 
tion without  retraction  would  be  vain.  It 
would  fall  on  the  ear  of  the  deaf  adder.  Flight 
wTas  impossible,  and  whichever  way  they  looked 
it  was  "  a  red,  red  sea  from  shore  to  shore." 

And  now,  at  this  fearful  crisis,  it  is  that 
there  occurs  another  of  those  wonderful  in- 
terventions to  which  the  church  had  so  often 
been  indebted  for  her  safety.  An  army  of  a 
hundred  thousand  Turks,  already  victorious 
in  battle,  are  wrenching  from  Ferdinand  his 
Hungarian  crown,  and  their  powerful  fleet 
hovers  menacingly  on  the  unprotected  coasts  of 
Sicily  and  Naples.  Even  Maurice  betrays  his 
trust  and  suddenly  heads  the  Protestant  con- 
federacy. The  astonished  Charles  flies  to 
Passau,  and  the  Council  of  Trent  disperse  in 
dismay.  The  distress  of  the  Papal  party  forced 
a  capitulation. 

The  Protestants,  armed  simply  in  self-defence, 
and  seeking  only  for  religious  toleration,  were 
ready  to  listen  to  terms,  and,  to  save  the  effu- 


EUROPE.  247 

sion  of  fraternal  blood,  agreed  to  march  against 
Solyman,  if  on  that  condition  Protestantism 
could  be  permanently  established  and  its  open 
book  and  holy  ministry  freed  from  further  mo- 
lestation. Ferdinand  seized  eagerly  this  pro- 
position, influenced  the  chafed  and  defeated 
Charles  to  sign  the  treaty,  and  the  pacification 
of  Passau  was  consummated  : — a  religious  peace, 
to  which  Home  was  driven  under  terror  of  the 
Turkish  sword. 

But  toward  the  Protestant  cause  it  was  a 
bare  and  a  reluctant  suspension  of  direct  hos- 
tilities. And  the  struggles  by  which  it  reached 
this  precarious  security  belonged  to  the  sinis- 
ter locality  on  which  was  placed  the  left  foot 
of  the  angel,  and  which  were  wholly  unknown 
to  the  happier  experience  of  the  church  in  the 
New  World.  In  it,  no  longer  trammelled  by 
state  control  or  old  or  wrong  opinions,  she 
gained  no  stinted  growth  underneath  the  over- 
shadowing walls  of  a  venerable  Establishment ; 
nor  is  her  very  being,  like  that  of  her  trans- 
atlantic sister  at  the  present  time,  threatened 
by  the  encroachments  of  Rome. 

While  Germany  thus  warred,  and  gained 
her  bare  permit  to  live  in  the  heart  of  an 
enemy's  country,  England  became  the  scene 
of  remarkable  changes,  which,  while  they  fa- 


248  ISHMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

voured  the  existence  and  growth  of  the  church, 
surrounded  her  nevertheless  at  the  same  time 
with  many  uncongenial  iniluences  not  felt 
beyond  the  Atlantic. 

Henry  VIII.,  quite  as  imperious  as  the 
sovereign  pontiff  whose  ecclesiastical  supre- 
macy and  benefices  he  appropriated,  became  a 
Protestant,  not  from  conviction,  but  from  cir- 
cumstances. Had  the  fear  of  offending  Charles 
not  been  in  the  ascendant  in  Italian  circles,  the 
desired  divorce  of  Catharine  would  have  been 
sanctioned,  and  Henry  would  have  remained 
the  fast  friend  of  the  Papacy.  He  cast  off  its 
jurisdiction,  indeed,  but  retained  its  spirit,  and 
sought  to  transfer  to  himself  a  papal  supremacy 
over  Great  Britain  : — to  fix  the  star  that  fell 
from  the  papal  tiara  into  the  Northern  Sea  in 
his  own  crown. 

Ignorant  of  the  true  nature  of  that  kingdom 
which  is  not  of  this  world,  it  seems  to  have 
occurred  to  him  as  most  reasonable  that  the 
crown  of  that  spiritual  lordship  now  lost  to 
his  Holiness  should  grace  the  brow  of  some 
other  than  that  of  Messias  alone.  Investing 
himself,  therefore,  with  a  ghostly  rule,  he  exer- 
cised to  a  considerable  extent  an  arbitrary 
spiritual  domination.  Cranmer's  superior  in- 
telligence modified  indeed  his  usurpations;  but 


EUROPE.  249 

his   influence  over  the  church  was  untoward 
and  his  reign  oppressive. 

Mary's  ultimate  accession  restored  Popery 
again,  and  that,  also,  with  an  easy  transition. 
The  poor  Protestants  were  renewedly  treated 
with  extreme  rigour.  England's  gentler  nature 
recoiled  in  horror  at  witnessing  tortures,  unpre- 
cedented for  their  cruelty,  inflicted  on  men  the 
most  venerable  and  the  most  virtuous  in  her 
realms. 

The  accession  of  Elizabeth  re-established  the 
Protestant  faith.  But  it  was  a  Protestantism 
which,  while  it  rejected  in  part  the  Catholic, 
rejected  also  in  part  the  Protestant,  opinions ; 
putting  itself  in  opposition,  in  many  respects, 
to  both,  and  laying  the  foundation  for  those 
animosities  and  persecutions  which  reveal  to 
our  calm  retrospection  the  imprint  on  English 
soil  of  the  left  foot  of  the  angel. 

Elizabeth  loved  a  spiritual  supremacy, — in- 
stituted her  Court  of  High  Commissions,  which 
has  not  unjustly  been  called  "the  British  Inqui- 
sition,"— issued  the  "Act  of  Uniformity," — de- 
nied that  the  Scriptures  were  the  only  rule  of 
faitli  and  practice ;  and,  claiming  that  the  fathers 
of  the  church  in  the  first  four  centuries  furnished 
an  improved  and  a  matured  ecclesiasticism  not 
found  in  the  Scriptures  alone,  demanded  that 
Q 


250  ISHMAEL  AND   THE    CHURCH. 

all  her  subjects  should  conform  to  her  esta- 
blishment. Non-conformists  were  oppressed. 
Many  of  therm  after  leaving  their  country  and 
wandering  into  Holland,  embarked  finally  for 
America,  taking  the  track  opened  for  them  in 
the  paths  of  the  sea. 

In  Switzerland,  Protestantism  won  her  tole- 
ration by  the  valour  of  her  sons.  Her  troubled 
life,  perpetuated  amid  the  factions  of  Geneva 
and  the  subtlety  of  Jesuitism,  has,  however, 
finally  met  the  fate  that  seems  impending 
over  all  her  sister-confederacies  in  Europe. 

Scotland,  nourished  at  the  fountains  of 
Geneva  and  roused  by  the  wild  eloquence  of 
Knox,  embraced  a  Christianity  which  acknow- 
ledged no  rule  of  faith  and  practice  save  the 
one  fairly  and  sufficiently  derived  from  the 
open  book  in  the  angel's  hand.  But,  neverthe- 
less, after  the  struggle  of  centuries,  with  the 
strong  fetters  of  the  Establishment  upon  her 
vigorous  limbs,  she  has  at  length  also  been 
driven  into  her  exodus,  and  in  that  solemn 
event  has  fully  asserted  the  superior  excel- 
lence of  her  American  and  her  model  Presby- 
terianism. 

In  France,  the  contest  for  religious  toleration 
was  long,  vigorous,  often  most  promising,  but 
finally  disastrous.     In  the  very  era  in  which 


EUROPE.  251 

Islamism  experienced  the  greatest  defeats  and 
the  crescent  waned  permanently  before  the 
cross, — in  which,  indeed,  the  Turks  met  with 
those  irreparable  reverses  from  which  they 
have  never  since  recovered, — the  revocation 
of  the  Edict  of  Nantes  occurred,  a.d.  1685. 

This  ruined  in  that  kingdom  the  Protestant 
cause,  filled  Geneva,  the  mountain-gorges  of 
the  Alps,  Holland,  England,  and  America,  with 
French  refugees.  A  million  fled  during  the 
extreme  rigour  of  that  long-continued  persecu- 
tion that  knew  no  mercy,  and  a  hundred 
thousand  perished  in  dungeons,  at  the  stake, 
or  by  the  sword. 

The  drain  upon  France  became  a  great  poli- 
tical event.  It  gave  creation  to  Holland :  to 
it,  and  to  England  also,  it  gave  the  balance  of 
power,  and  likewise  furnished  the  American 
colonies — on  the  North  Biver  and  in  other 
places — with  many  of  their  most  valuable  ac- 
quisitions. New  York  became  a  Huguenot 
island;  and  her  prestige  and  her  wonderful 
prosperity  is  still  welling  up  from  these  secret 
fountains. 

Providence,  too,  has  his  reprisals,  and 
avenged  his  servants  in  that  "  plat"  in  which 
they  suffered.  The  bloody  scenes  of  the  sub- 
sequent revolution  might  well  be  expected  to 


252  ISHMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

follow  such  an  exhaustion  of  national  purity 
and  conservatism.  The  councils  of  cruel  Rome 
had  well-nigh  ruined  France, — had  sent  a 
cancer  on  her  cheek  and  a  wolf  into  her 
breast, — had  first  shed  her  best  blood  and  ex- 
patriated her  best  citizens, — and  then  had  left 
her  to  the  tender  mercies  of  men  educated,  by 
the  example  of  their  persecuting  sires,  in  the 
school  of  a  most  brutal  violence. 

These,  in  the  next  age,  became  in  their  turn 
the  ministers  of  avenging  Heaven,  in  whose 
bosoms  there  was  no  pity  and  in  whose  cruel- 
ties no  relentings.  By  them  were  the  fearful 
butcheries  of  the  Revolution  enacted : — a  wan- 
ton waste  of  life  more  terrible  than  any  ever 
known  in  any  example  of  former  times;  a 
"  reign  of  terror"  that  could  exist  only  in  the 
lawlessness  of  such  a  generation. 

And  now,  after  a  long  interval,  on  a  review 
of  such  scenes  of  horror,  and  on  following  the 
refugees  to  their  respective  retreats  in  the  Old 
and  in  the  New  World,  it  is  not  difficult  to  de- 
termine whether  those  who  fled  to  Geneva,  to 
Holland,  to  England,  or  those  that  crossed  the 
ocean,  took  the  most  desirable  path.  Geneva 
has  passed  substantially  into  the  hands  of  the 
Catholics.  Holland  is  losing  her  Protestant- 
ism by  the  plottings  of  her  foes  and  by  the 


EUROPE.  253 

emigration  of  her  children  to  the  New  World ; 
and  what  will  be  the  destiny  of  England  before 
ten  years  shall  have  passed  away,  time  will 
show.  Developments  thus  far,  in  any  event, 
award  the  wisdom  of  a  happier  selection  to 
those  who  followed  the  angel's  track  across 
the  sea. 

Staten  Island,  the  beautiful  valleys  of  the 
Hudson  and  the  Mohawk,  the  James  River  in 
Virginia,  and  the  Trent,  in  North  Carolina, 
became  in  an  early  day  the  secure  retreat  of 
thousands.  The  number,  wealth,  and  pros- 
perity of  these  settlements,  in  contrast  with 
the  disfranchisements,  increasing  poverty,  and 
failing  struggles  of  those  left  behind  in  the  Old 
World,  are  of  themselves  a  demonstration  of  the 
correctness  of  the  view  now  taken,  even  though 
that  view  were  not  endorsed  by  the  vision  of 
John. 

22 


CHAPTER  XXXI. 

ISLAMISM   AND   THE   REFORMATION. CONTINUED. 

Across  the  land  the  crescent  flew, — 

It  flew  across  the  sea ; 
It  shook  the  Papal  turrets  hoar ; 

It  shook  the  West  for  thee. 

How  wonderfully  also  were  the  fortunes  of 
the  church,  amid  all  the  foregoing  strifes  and 
changes,  influenced  by  Ishmael!  The  fall  of 
Constantinople  led  to  the  revival  of  letters  and 
to  the  study  of  the  languages  in  which  the 
Scriptures  were  originally  written:  a  most 
material  auxiliary  to  the  opening  of  the  book 
in  the  angel's  hand.  The  subsequent  wars  and 
invasions  of  the  Turks  led  finally  to  the  sale 
of  indulgences  under  the  pontificate  of  Leo  X. 
It  was  the  method  suggested  by  the  unscru- 
pulous pontiff,  and  relied  upon  by  him  to  raise 
the  means  of  conducting  a  crusade  against  the 
Moslem  infidel. 

"In  fact,"  said  Luther,  "the  war  with  the 
Turks  was  the  war  of  the  Pope.     It  was  an 

254 


THE   OTTOMANS.  255 

offensive  war,  and  a  war  founded  on  no  good 
principle.  It  was  made  a  pretext  for  exhaust- 
ing Germany  of  its  money  by  the  sale  of  indul- 
gences." But  for  this,  then,  the  controversy 
between  Luther  and  Tetzel  would  not  have 
occurred.  It  w^as  one  of  the  indispensable  links 
in  the  chain  of  causes  which  led  on  to  the  great 
Reformation. 

Indeed,  the  rise,  progress,  and  best  suc- 
cesses of  that  reformation  synchronize  with 
the  rising  and  progressing  fortunes  of  the 
Ottomans  in  Europe.  When  their  empire 
culminates  and  begins  to  decline,  Catholicism 
begins  to  repair  hef  losses  and  to  rise  again 
to  power.  Seventeen  years  after  Eugene's 
great  victory  over  failing  Turkey,  A.D.  1699, 
the  Order  of  the  Jesuits  is  revived,  and  their 
withering  councils  secretly  influence  the  cabi- 
nets of  princes,  and  proscribed  and  manacled 
Protestantism  steadily  loses,  one  by  one,  her 
territorial  acquisitions,  and  commences  to  be 
beaten  back  from  the  foot  of  the  Alps  to  the 
British  Channel. 

And,  if  the  decline  of  Protestantism  and  the 
recovery  of  the  Papacy  shall  continue  to  keep 
pace  with  the  decline  and  the  probably  ap- 
proaching fall  of  Turkey  in  the  future  as  it 
has   in   the   past,  its   ultimate  disappearance 


256  ISHMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

from  Europe  is  quite  inevitable ;  and  Borne — 
ambitious  Rome — is  yet  destined  to  erect,  on 
the  ruins  of  Mien  rivalries,  a  throne  more 
magnificent  and  powerful  than  that  which 
crowned  the  seven  hills  in  the  palmiest  days 
of  Hildebrand  or  Leo  X. 

The  incursions  and  the  conquests  of  the 
Turks  in  Europe,  from  a.d.  1453  to  a.d.  1697, — 
a  period  of  two  hundred  and  forty-four  years, — 
were  mighty,  providential  indirections,  making 
Ishmael  the  blind  yet  effective  umpire  between 
the  church  and  her  powerful  foes,  calling  off 
the  persecutors  just  on  the  eve  of  their  success, 
and  that,  from  time  to  time,  to  attend  to  their 
own  safety. 

During  this  period, — the  period  memorable  in 
all  time,  because  traversed  by  the  events  and 
consequences  of  the  great  Reformation, — Rome 
continued  to  be  besieged  in  all  her  coasts. 
The  iEgean  Sea  and  the  Mediterranean  con- 
tinued to  be  swept  by  successive  fleets,  fitted  out 
by  the  indefatigable  Porte.  Its  armies  followed 
each  other  perpetually,  and  successively  also, 
into  Austria,  Hungary,  and  Transylvania. 
The  twro  last-named  regions  were  brought  under 
Ottoman  rule,  and  retained  for  one  hundred 
and  seventy,  years  in  defiance  of  the  Western 
powers.     Indeed,  the  warlike  character  of  the 


THE   OTTOMANS.  257 

Turks  at  this  time,  the  boldness  and  military 
skill  of  their  leaders,  their  frequent  enterprises 
of  war  and  bloody  victories,  exhausted  the 
empire,  and  were  its  perpetual  terror  and 
scourge.* 

Having,  however,  at  the  end  of  this  period, 
fulfilled  its  mission, — having  concentrated  and 
exhausted  hostilities  on  itself  that  would  other- 
wise have  expended  their  fury  in  the  extermi- 
nation of  the  church, — and  having  afforded  the 
church  her  providential  opportunity  of  flight 
across  the  sea, — its  power  was  broken.  Prince 
Eugene,  in  A.d.  1697,  gained  over  it  a  victory 
from  which  it  never  recovered.  It  lost  pro- 
vinces, kingdoms,  and  the  power  of  recupera- 
tion, in  that  defeat.  The  peace  concluded  in  a.d. 
1699  gave  back  to  the  empire  Transylvania, 
Hungary,  Asaph,  the  Ukraine,  and  Podolia, — 
the  entire  peninsula  of  the  Morea  to  the  Isthmus 
of  Corinth,  including  Dalmatia. 

From  this  epoch,  the  steady  decline  of  the 
Ottoman  strength  and  prowess  is  marked;  and 
it  continues  to  the  present  hour  to  give  out 
still  the  tokens  of  a  deep  and  fatal  decay  in 

*  Mosheiin's  Eccl.  History,  Sixteenth  Century,  and  Mil- 
nor's,  covering  the  same  period;  Robertson's  Charles  V., 
from  book  iii.  to  x.  inclusive. 
22* 


258      ISHMAEL  AND  THE  CHURCH. 


* 


all  those  respects  in  which  it  had  been  formid- 
able and  terrible  before. 

The  period  selected  for  the  great  revival  of 
religion  was  one  marked  by  the  skill,  courage, 
and  culture  of  the  Rulers  of  the  earth.  Con- 
spicuous among  these  were  Henry  VTIL,  Francis 
L,  Charles  V.,  and  Leo  X.  But,  among  these, 
Solyman  the  Great  shone  with  a  transcendent 
lustre. 

His  accession  to  the  throne  in  a.d.  1521  was 
at  once  the  summit  of  its  grandeur  and  the 
signal  for  the  outbursting  of  Moslem  propa- 
gandism  anew  in  its  aggressive  wars.  Bel- 
grade, deemed  at  that  time  the  great  barrier 
in  the  North  against  Turkish  invasion,  was 
invested  by  the  sultan,  and  soon  fell  into  his 
hands.  Against  Rhodes,  the  impregnable  for- 
tress of  the  Archipelago,  defended  by  the 
chivalry  of  eight  Christian  nations,  and  hither- 
to the  terror  of  the  Saracens,  he  persevered 
in  a  siege  of  five  months,  with  a  fleet  of  four 
hundred  sail  and  an  army  of  one  hundred  and 
forty  thousand  men.  And,  though  at  a  loss  of 
one  hundred  thousand  of  his  troops,  he  con- 
tinued the  contest  until  it  was  reduced  to  his 
sway. 

This  earnest  of  his  iron  will  and  pledge  of 
his  future  career  was  succeeded  by  the  con- 


THE   OTTOMANS.  259 

quest  of  the  Crimea.  Hungary  shortly  after 
delivered  up  the  keys  of  her  proud  capital  to 
the  fierce  Solyman.  The  bloody  Caled  had 
revived  in  his  person ;  and  the  right  hand  of 
Ishmael  wanted  not  one  to  wield  its  scimitar. 
The  whole  country,  as  far  as  Raab,  blackened 
by  the  ilames  of  war,  was  encumbered  and 
pestilential  from  the  mangled  remains  of  two 
hundred  thousand  inhabitants. 

In  A.D.  1529  his  victorious  army  sat  down 
before  the  capital  of  Austria;  and,  though 
arrested  at  this  point,  and  obliged  to  retreat 
on  account  of  the  fall  rains,  he  reappeared  in 
the  spring,  A.D.  1532,  at  the  head  of  two  hun- 
dred thousand  men,  against  Charles  V.  He 
finally  intrenched  himself  on  the  Danube,  in 
which  place  he  received  and  accepted  the 
emperor's  propositions  of  peace.  Shortly  after 
this  he  partially  subdued  the  Venetian  islands, 
and,  recruiting  his  forces,  prepared  for  new 
enterprises. 

In  1541  he  again  invaded  Hungary;  and 
numerous  conflicts  renewedly  shook  the  trou- 
bled West,  until  Charles  succeeded  in  negotia- 
ting another  treaty  of  peace  with  his  for- 
midable rival.  This  treaty,  nevertheless,  was 
speedily  forgotten,  and  Transylvania  was  added 
to  the  dominions  of  the  sultan.     He  died  a.d. 


260      ISHMAEL  AND  THE  CnURCH. 

1566,  while  actively  engaged  in  a  war  with 
Hungary. 

The  following  corresponding  dates  are  worthy 
of  special  attention,  since  they  furnish  the  suc- 
cinct evidence  of  providential  intervention  to 
save  the  church,  while  the  Reformation  was 
in  progress,  through  the  agency  of  Moslem 
armies. 

In  a.d.  1521  Luther  is  condemned  by  the 
Diet  at  Worms,  and  by  a  ruse  of  his  friends 
lies  concealed  at  the  Wartburg;  and  at  the 
same  time  Solyman  draws  his  terrific  scimitar 
and  threatens  the  West  with  eventual  subjuga- 
tion. The  empire  is  skirted  with  hostile  Heets 
and  armies,  and  many  a  fair  province  is  laid 
waste  with  fire  and  sword. 

In  a.d.  1524  Clement  VIII.  sent  his  legate  to 
the  Diet  at  Nuremberg,  breathing  threatenings 
and  slaughter  against  the  Reformation,  and  de- 
manding of  the  princes  of  the  empire  the 
execution  of  the  decree  of  Worms  against 
Luther.  In  the  same  year,  and  when  his 
safety  is  in  imminent  peril,  Solyman  again 
entered  Hungary  in  force,  gained  a  signal  vic- 
tory, received  the  keys  of  the  conquered  capi- 
tal, and  put  to  death  in  the  rural  districts  two 
hundred  thousand  citizens. 

The  tranquillity  enjoyed  after  the  first  Diet 


THE   OTTOMANS.  261 

of  Spire  was  interrupted,  in  a.d.  1529,  by  a 
second  Diet  in  the  same  place.  In  the  same  year 
the  sultan  appeared  with  a  vast  army  and  com- 
menced the  siege  of  Vienna.  The  persecutors, 
eager  to  ruin  the  Keformation,  had  to  turn  back, 
to  repel  the  foe  that  hung  in  terror  on  their 
bleeding  rear;  and  at  this  juncture  it  was 
that  Luther,  accused  of  indifference  as  to  the 
Turkish  invasion,  wrote  his  celebrated  letter  in 
favour  of  the  war  against  the  Turks.* 

The  severe  decree  against  the  Protestants 
issued  by  order  of  Charles,  ever  under  the 
controlling  influence  of  the  Pope  and  his  car- 
dinals, and  which  led  the  alarmed  Protestants 
to  assemble  at  Smalcald,  A.D.  1530,  occurred 
simultaneously  with  the  revived  hostilities  of 
Solyman  against  Hungary.  The  Catholics, 
alarmed  at  his  progress,  were  again  forced  to 
abandon  their  bloody  purposes  and  to  implore 
the  aid  of  the  Protestants.f 

In  a.d.  1532  the  treaty  of  Nuremberg  was 
concluded,  on  condition  that  the  Protestants 
should  furnish  a  subsidy  for  carrying  on  the 
war  against  the  Turks. 

In  a.d.  1541  Solyman  again  commenced  a 


*  Milluer,  p.  515. 

f  Maclane's  Mosheim,  vol.  i.  pp.  o3;  34. 


262       ISHMAEL  AND  THE  CHURCH. 

bloody  war  against  the  West,  resolved  on  its 
subjugation.  It  raged  most  fearfully  during 
the  sessions  of  the  Council  of  Trent,  wasting 
the  invaded  provinces  with  fire  and  sword,  and 
as  though  in  awful  providential  rebuke  of  that 
council  for  consigning  the  Protestant  church  to 
Inquisitorial  and  military  destruction.  And, 
just  in  proportion  as  the  Catholics  wasted  their 
strength  and  fury  upon  the  suffering  church, 
Solyman  was  successful  against  them,  gaining 
strength  and  maturing  his  plans  for  the  con- 
quest of  Europe. 

And,  finally,  when  the  pacification  of  Passau 
was  pending,  "the  Turks  ....  had  prepared 
a  powerful  fleet  to  ravage  the  coast  of  Naples 

and  Sicily Besides,  Solyman  ....  had 

ordered  into  the  field  an  army  of  a  hundred 
thousand  men,  which,  having  defeated  a  great 
body  of  Ferdinand's  troops  and  taken  several 
places  of  importance,  threatened  not  only  to 
complete  the  conquest  of  the  province,  but  to 
drive  them  out  of  that  part  of  Hungary. 
Maurice,  having  observed  Ferdinand's  per- 
plexity, ....  offered,  if  peace  were  re-esta- 
blished on  a  secure  foundation,  that  he  would 
march  in  person  with  his  troops  into  Hungary 
against  the  Turks.  Such  was  the  effect  of 
this  well-timed  proposal,  that  Ferdinand,  desti- 


THE   OTTOMANS.  263 

tute  of  every  other  prospect  of  relief,  became 
the  most  zealous  advocate  whom  the  confede- 
rates could  have  employed  to  urge  their 
claims ;  and  there  was  hardly  any  thing  that 
they  could  have  demanded  which  he  would 
not  have  chosen  to  grant,  rather  than  have 
retarded  a  pacification  to  which  he  trusted  as 
the  only  means  of  saving  his  Hungarian 
crown."* 

In  this  extraordinary  manner  was  the  war  of 
extermination  against  the  Protestants,  though 
resolved  upon,  and  with  hostilities  already 
begun  in  several  instances,  kept  in  arrest  from 
time  to  time.  The  Catholic  princes  needed 
the  aid  of  their  Protestant  subjects,  and  on 
one  occasion  sought  and  obtained  the  aid  of 
the  condemned  Luther's  vigorous  pen  in  favour 
of  what  was  termed  the  defensive  war.  Pro- 
testant and  Catholic  were  exhorted  to  make 
common  cause  against  a  common  enemy. 

The  Reformers  experienced  for  many  succes- 
sive years  these  alternations  of  papal  smiles 
and  frowns,  supplications  and  persecutions. 
When  the  Turks  were  driven  back,  her  foes 
resorted  at  once  to  their  cruel  remedy  for 
heresy, — "  the  cautery  and  the  knife."    But,  just 


*  Robertson's  Charles  V. ;  book  x.  pp.  412,  413. 


264      ISHMAEL  AND  THE  CHURCH. 

as  they  were  congratulating  themselves,  and 
were  about  to  sit  down  to  the  long-delayed 
banquet  of  blood,  they  are  suddenly  called  off 
to  meet  the  fierce  Ishmael  thundering  at  their 
invaded  gates. 

Thus,  while  Islamism  remained,  the  woe  or 
the  scourge  of  Christendom,  Protestantism 
gradually  rose  and  prevailed.  But  now,  since 
Turkey  has  commenced  her  fatal  decline  and 
is  just  ready  to  disappear  from  Europe,  Pro- 
testantism is  also  in  the  same  perilous  con- 
dition there,  and  is  likely  to  lose  very  soon 
her  last  inch  of  European  soil. 

But  her  decline  and  that  of  Turkey  is 
accompanied  with  the  steady  and  simultaneous 
growth  of  Romanism  in  Europe  and  of  Pro- 
testantism in  America. 

The  decline  of  Protestantism  in  Europe  is 
not  at  present  a  loss  by  persecution  or  by  a 
return  of  her  converts  to  Popery,  but  by  a 
vast  exodus  which  has  lasted  for  more  than  a 
century,  which  still  continues  and  increases, 
and  which  year  by  year  makes  yet  more  bril- 
liant and  unmistakable  the  luminous  footprint 
of  the  an^el  in  the  sea. 


CHAPTER  XXXII. 

THE   WITNESSES   NOT    SLAIN. 

The  last  are  fallen,  unwept,  that  bore 
The  bated  cross  in  days  of  yore ; 
They  sleep  as  though,  despite  the  rack, 
The  soul  departed  might  come  back. 

The  measurement  of  the  holy  places  and 
the  death  and  resurrection  of  the  witnesses 
are  the  next  events  marked  by  the  prophet, 
and  which  are  to  precede  and  accompany  the 
passing  away  of  the  second  woe.  Along  this 
track,  therefore,  let  us  take  our  way,  that  we 
may  reach  and  understand  the  character  and 
tendency  of  the  events  of  our  own  times,  so 
startling  and  portentous,  and  which  are  hardly 
passed  away  in  a  sea  of  blood  ere  new  and 
threatening  masses  are  beginning  to  gather  and 
to  hang  heavy  and  dark  over  the  earth. 

"And  there  was  given  me  a  reed  like  unto  a 
rod:  and  the  angel  stood,  saying,  Rise,  and 
measure  the  temple  of  God,  and  the  altar,  and 
them  that  worship  therein.  But  the  court 
which  is  without  the   temple  leave  out,  and 

23  R  265 


266  ISHMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

measure  it  not;  for  it  is  given  unto  the  Gentiles : 
and  the  holy  city  shall  they  tread  under  foot 
forty  and  two  months."*  God  took  formal 
possession  of  the  land  of  Canaan  by  lot.  It 
was  measured  and  thus  appropriated.-)-  This 
method  of  taking  possession  of  the  Holy  Land 
made  the  act  of  measuring,  in  prophetic  par- 
lance, to  signify  the  appropriation  of  that  which 
was  measured. 

To  "  divide  Shechem  and  mete  out  the 
valley  of  Succoth"  was  all  the  same  as  the 
taking  actual  possession  of  these  places.  The 
appearance  of  an  angel  with  a  measuriug-line, 
and  with  it  measuring  Jerusalem,  was  the  reve- 
lation of  the  divine  intention  again  to  take 
possession  of  the  fallen  and  abandoned  city. 

The  word  of  God — "  the  only  infallible  rule 
of  faith  and  practice" — began  in  the  early  part 
of  the  seventh  century  to  be  used  as  a  mea- 
suring-rod or  rule,  in  its  discriminative  appli- 
cation to  a  true  and  a  false  Christianity.  A 
large  proportion  of  the  visible  church  was  by 
this  rule  declared  to  have  lost  its  church-state, 
and  the  Pope  in  consequence,  even  as  early  as 
A.D.  606,  was  quite  generally  regarded  as  the 
man  of  sin. 

*  Rev.  xi.  1,  2.  j-  Josh.  xxiv.  13. 


THE   WITNESSES.  2G7 

The  court  which  was  without  was  a  square 
enclosure,  covering  an  area  much  larger  than 
that  covered  by  the  temple.  Hence,  the  em- 
blem suggests  that  the  rejected  portion  of  the 
visible  church,  at  the  time  intended  by  the 
prophet,  should  comprise  by  far  the  greater 
part  of  it.  This  was  given  to  be  trodden  down 
of  Gentile  feet,  or  by  idolaters. 

These,  it  is  generally  conceded,  were  the 
Goths  and  Vandals,  who  overran  and  subdued 
the  Roman  empire,  appropriated  its  religion, 
its  lands,  and  its  laws,  as  their  own,  and  became 
themselves  Romans.  Christianity,  already 
sadly  deteriorated,  was  made  far  more  so  under 
the  profane  alliance  with  its  idolatrous  con- 
verts. The  Pope  and  Bishop  of  Rome  aided 
also  in  its  total  desecration.  He  conformed  it, 
with  misguided  zeal,  to  the  pagan  tastes  of  the 
conquerors,  that  he  might  thereby  the  more 
readily  turn  them  into  Christians. 

Christianity,  while  thus  appearing  to  con- 
quer the  victors,  but  conquered  itself.  The 
conversion  was  not  of  barbarism  to  Chris- 
tianity, but  of  Christianity  to  barbarism.  Re- 
ligion fell  in  its  holy  city,  or  in  the  visible 
church ;  and,  despite  the  resistance  of  a  small 
and  a  retreating  minority,  its  rule  of  faith,  its 


268  ISHMAEL   AND   THE  CHURCH. 

atonement,  and  its  sanctity,  were  alike  trampled 
under  Gentile  feet. 

The  same  sagacious  ecclesiastic  that  filled 
the  church  with  idolaters  restored  also  the 
broken  succession  of  the  Cassars,  by  becoming 
himself  the  true  source  of  imperial  and  kingly 
power.  The  imperial,  the  consular,  and  the 
senatorial  forms  of  government  shone  for  ages 
in  the  capital  of  the  Caesars.  But  the  last  of 
the  Caesars  finally  disappeared,  and  the  ensigns 
of  the  throne  and  of  the  palace  were  transferred 
to  Constantinople.  In  the  Eternal  City,  and 
throughout  the  kingdoms  of  the  West,  the 
savages  of  the  North  and  their  successors  held 
the  mastery.  The  division  of  the  imperial 
rule  between  Rome  and  Constantinople  was  all 
that  saved  the  empire,  at  this  time,  from  total 
extinction.  The  interregnum  lasted  for  two 
hundred  years.  "The  day  shone  not  for  a 
third  part  of  it,  and  the  night  likewise."* 

From  this  epoch  the  Pope  and  Bishop  of 
Rome,  proclaimed  by  the  emperor  at  Constan- 
tinople universal  bishop,  and  being  at  the 
same  time  a  native  Roman  and  a  true  patrician, 
took  up  the  fallen  sceptre  of  the  Caesars,  and, 
by  conferring  it  on  Charlemagne,  restored  the 

*Rev.  viii.  12. 


THE   WITNESSES.  269 

long-lost  glory  of  the  West.  From  France  the 
imperial  dignity  passed  to  Germany,  and  from 
thence,  in  the  memory  of  many  now  living,  it 
reverted  again  to  France.  It  was  conferred  by 
Pius  VII.  on  Napoleon.  He  assumed  the 
golden  crown  of  Charlemagne  and  the  iron 
crown  of  Italy. 

Rome  not  only  restored  her  ecclesiastical  and 
her  civil  ascendency  by  her  wily  and  ghostly 
representative ;  she  also  recruited  her  exhausted 
energies  by  absorbing  in  her  own  the  hardier 
manhood  of  Northern  nations.  The  sources  of 
her  ruin  became  thus,  and  in  more  respects 
than  one,  the  sources  of  her  renovated  strength ; 
and  she  again  reigned  "  over  the  kings  of  the 
earth. "*  It  was,  indeed,  a  wonderful  event: — 
the  actual  and  the  healthful  reproduction  of 
an  expired  life,  and  that  in  the  very  moment 
and  by  the  very  means  of  its  total  extinction. 

But,  alas,  in  thus  for  the  second  time  setting 
her  iron  heel  on  her  recovered  and  submissive 
domain  she  also  placed,  as  the  price  of  her 
triumph,  her  dishonoured  Christianity  under 
Gentile  feet.  Its  true  God  gave  place  to  patron 
saints  and  local  deities.  In  all  her  sanctuaries 
His  praise  was  given  to  crucifixes  and  graven 

*Rev.  xvii.  18. 
23* 


270  ISIIMAEL  AND   THE   CHURCH. 

images.  Its  blessed  Redeemer  was  made  in- 
ferior to  the  Virgin,  and  was  set  aside  in  his 
gracious  mediation  by  a  vast  army  of  saints  and 
martyrs.  Its  unadorned  simplicity  of  worship 
disappeared  in  a  pompous  ritual.  Its  purify- 
ing and  intelligible  utterances  were  supplanted 
by  unintelligible  and  awful  mysteries  addressed 
to  the  senses.  "Signs  and  lying  wonders" 
were  made  the  incentives  to  obedience  and 
the  sources  of  religious  veneration.  In  a  word, 
almost  all  that  was  pure,  distinctive,  and  di- 
vine became,  as  the  result,  outcast  and  down- 
trodden in  the  visible  church. 

The  period  in  which  this  state  of  things  be- 
gan to  be  is  marked,  first,  by  the  discriminative 
application  of  the  rule  or  rod  (referred  to  as 
above  by  the  prophet)  in  determining  the 
limits  of  the  true  church.  Such  use  of  the  word 
had  become  common  in  the  beginning  of  the 
seventh  century. 

Secondly,  in  A.d.  G06,  when  Phocas  pro- 
claimed the  Pope  of  Rome  universal  bishop,  he 
became  at  once  to  the  godly  the  revealed  head 
of  the  apostasy,  and  was  denounced  as  the 
Antichrist  of  this  prophecy  and  of  the  Scrip- 
tures. 

Thirdly,  he  was  the  man  of  sin  before  he 
became   a   temporal    prince :    since   the   little 


THE   WITNESSES.  271 

horn  spoken  of  by  Daniel*  was,  nevertheless,  a 
horn,  or  power,  before  it  rose  above  the  three 
dynasties  which  it  subverted.  Indeed,  the 
Pope's  subsequent  assumption  of  the  dignity  of 
a  temporal  prince  was  the  lesser  form  of  the 
iniquity.  These  are  some  of  the  reasons  which 
suggest  the  propriety  of  commencing  our  reck- 
oning of  the  twelve  hundred  and  sixty  years 
of  the  prophecy  with  the  commencement  of  the 
visible  exaltation  of  the  Pope  to  spiritual  supre- 
macy in  the  church,  i.e.  A.  d.  GOG. 

Another  distinct  ground  on  which  we  arrive 
at  the  same  conclusion  may  be  found  in  the 
prophecy  of  Daniel.f  "The-  king  of  fierce 
countenance,"  and  understanding  dark  sen- 
tences, arose,  according  to  this  prophet,  at  the 
latter  end  of  the  four  kingdoms  into  which 
Alexander's  dominions  had  been  divided.  He 
terminated  their  reign  when  he  conquered 
Persia.  Mohammed  was  fierce  in  the  emo- 
tions of  his  cruel  nature  and  in  the  principles 
and  sympathies  of  his  faith.  His  successes 
wrere  also  achieved  by  incoherent  or  dark  sen- 
tences.    He  obtained  his  KoranJ  in  sentences, 


*  Dan.  vii.  8.  f  Dan.  ™-  23' 

J  "  The  fragments  of  the  Koran  were  produced  at  the 
discretion  of  Mohammed The  pages,  without  order 


272  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

as  he  affirmed,  in  which  the  last,  however 
contradictory,  modified  and  explained  all  that 
went  before.  Sentences  most  dark  and  contra- 
dictory became  also  the  ultimate  foundations 
of  his  power,  gave  creation  to  his  army  and 
victory  to  his  lieutenants.  A  coincidence  so 
striking  should  not  be  overlooked ;  and  it  may 
legitimately  influence  our  judgment  with  re- 
spect to  the  time  of  the  end,  since  the  rise  of  the 
Southern  Antichrist  was  evidently  synchronical 
with  the  exaltation  of  the  Papacy.  They  are 
both  the  renowned  enemies  of  progress  and  of 
piety  in  the  North  and  in  the  South,  originate 
at  the  same  time,  run  to  the  present  day  their 
parallel  courses.  And  is  it  not  a  probable  con- 
clusion that  they  are  destined  to  joerish  nearly 
simultaneously,  and  especially  as  to  each  is 
assigned  the  same  prophetic  period  ?* 

The  period  also  in  which  the  witnesses  were 
to  prophesy  in  sackcloth  is  the  same.     And  it 

is  quite  natural  to  conclude  that  their  sack- 
«    

or  connection,  were  cast  into  a  domestic  chest. "  Farther 
down,  on  the  same  page,  the  Koran  is  described  as  "the 
endless,  incoherent  rhapsody  of  fable  and  precept  and  decla- 
mation, which  seldom  excites  a  sentiment  or  an  idea,  which 
sometimes  crawls  in  the  dust,  and  is  sometimes  lost  in  the 
clouds." — Gibbon,  vol.  v.  p.  110. 
*  Twelve  hundred  and  sixty  days. 


THE   WITNESSES.  273 

cloth  garb  was  the  result  of  Papal  and  Moham- 
medan ascendency  over  the  very  regions  of 
the  earth  in  which  a  primitive  Christianity 
had  previously  spread  her  principles  and  her 
churches.  Their  respective  empires  were  en- 
gines of  fearful  misrule  and  of  spiritual  desola- 
tion. And  during  most  of  the  long  interval 
that  has  elapsed — an  interval  already  rilling  up 
nearly  the  whole  of  the  assigned  cycle — the  true 
church  has  found  a  bare  toleration  among  the 
Saracens,  or  a  precarious  retreat  in  the  gorges 
of  bleak  and  inaccessible  mountains.  The 
periods  of  revival,  of  success,  or  of  repose,  have 
been  ever  brief,  and  invariably  partial.  These 
even  have  had  their  tears,  have  been  accom- 
panied with  political  and  social  oppressions. 
On  the  whole,  in  all  Papal  and  in  all  Moham- 
medan countries,  Zion  has  ever  bowed  her 
dejected  head,  has  ever  been  placed  in  a 
comparatively  depressed  and  sorrowful  con- 
dition. 

Her  members  also  have  been  comparatively 
very  inconsiderable;  her  home  the  circum- 
scribed spot  occupied  by  the  temple  and  the 
altar.  Such  is  the  small  but  consecrated  en- 
closure; while  her  numerous  and  powerful  ad- 
versaries are  represented  as  spreading  them- 
selves over  the  whole  area  of  the  open  court, 


274  ISIIMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

whose  sacred  things  they  impiously  monopolize 
and  profanely  trample. 

Her  witnesses,  likewise,  during  this  same 
prophetic  interval,  have  been  but  two, — the 
smallest  possible  number  admissible  in  law  to 
establish  a  fact.  So  few  indeed  have  they 
been,  that  their  unbroken  succession  during 
this  prophetic  cycle  has  been  often  disputed 
by  their  enemies;  and  confessedly  by  us  they 
have  been,  though  sufficient,  yet  barely  suffi- 
cient to  continue  a  visible  descent  and  to 
maintain  the  credibility  of  a  holy  testimony  in 
a  world  abandoned  elsewhere  in  all  its  vast 
communities  to  the  reign  of  atheism  or  false 
religion. 

Such  is  the  melancholy  image  presented  b}' 
the  prophet,  and  such  have  been  the  corre- 
sponding realities  of  history.  "  And  I  will  give 
power  unto  my  two  witnesses,  and  they  shall 
prophesy  a  thousand  two  hundred  and  three- 
score days,  clothed  in  sackcloth. "* 

After  the  death  and  resurrection  of  the 
witnesses  the  state  of  oppression  shall  cease. 
But  that  blessed  hour  of  Zion's  joy  and  enfran- 
chisement has  not  yet  come.  Her  foes  are  first 
to  kill  her  witnesses,  before  they  can  rise  again 

*  Rev.  xi.  3. 


THE   WITNESSES.  275 

in  the  final  and  joyous  prevalence  of  their 
truthful  prophecy : — "And  when  they  shall  have 
finished  their  testimony,"  i.e.  in  sackcloth,  "the 
beast  that  ascendeth  out  of  the  bottomless  pit 
shall  make  war  against  them,  and  shall  over- 
come them  and  kill  them."*  Such  an  event, 
it  is  maintained  by  some,  has  already  occurred. 
A  brief  examination  of  this  question,  however, 
must,  we  think,  result  in  the  conviction  that, 
sad  as  has  frequently  been  the  state  of  the  true 
church  in  Catholic  Europe,  a  sadder  hour  still 
awaits  her  there. 

In  the  twelfth  century  the  country  of  the 
Albigenses  wTas  made  desolate  by  the  Cru- 
saders, under  Simon  de  Montfort.  The  testi- 
mony of  the  witnesses  was  for  a  season  par- 
tially, if  not  wholly,  suppressed  within  its  terri- 
torial limits.  But  it  was  at  the  same  time 
fully  uttered  in  other  places.  The  suppression 
was  not  such  as  that  represented  in  the  pro- 
phecy,— the  deep  silence  of  the  grave  over  all 
the  kingdoms  of  Europe,  and  that  suddenly 
and  simultaneously. 

Two  hundred  years  afterward,  (a.d.  1400,) 
the  "Waldenses,  in  the  valley  of  Pragela,  were 
also  nearly  or  quite  exterminated.     Starving 


*  Rev.  xi. 


276  ISHMAEL    AND   THE    CHURCH. 

mothers  ascended  the  mountains  with  their 
children  and  perished.  One  hundred  and 
eighty  little  ones  were  found  dead  in  their 
cradles.  Other  churches,  however,  escaped 
the  visitation  and  continued  their  testimony. 
In  a.d.  1460,  or  sixty  years  after,  in  the 
valley  of  Loyse,  four  hundred  infants  were 
smothered  in  a  cave  in  the  arms  of  their  dying- 
mothers,  and  three  thousand  disciples  slain.  In 
this  valley  the  church  at  this  time  became 
extinct,  but  not  at  the  same  time  elsewhere. 

One  hundred  years  subsequently  to  this,  (a.d. 
1560,)  the  Calabrian  Waldenses  were  wholly 
exterminated.  Silence  and  darkness  spread 
over  that  island  in  which  they  had  main- 
tained their  suffering  mission  during  ninety 
years.  But  the  witnesses  still  lived  and  testi- 
fied in  many  other  places  in  Europe,  notwith- 
standing. 

In  after-times,  the  Inquisition  consigned  the 
true  church  in  Spain  to  its  dungeons,  and  her 
voice  was  heard  no  more  among  the  living  in 
that  kingdom.  Subsequently,  her  testimony 
was  silenced  in  France.  Her  Huguenots  were 
slain  or  expatriated.  At  another  time,  it  was 
for  a  season  suppressed  in  Scotland  by  Arch- 
bishop Laud,  and  by  the  bloody  Mary  in  Eng- 
land. 


THE   WITNESSES.  277 

But  these,  though  terrible,  were  but  par- 
tial, exterminations, — circumscribed  fields  of 
slaughter,  placed  at  distant  intervals  from 
each  other,  occurring  in  different  and  wide- 
ly-separated districts  and  kingdoms;  and  no 
one  of  them  occurring  on  any  single  isolated 
plat,  can  possibly  be  claimed  to  have  been  at 
any  time  universal.  Rome,  indeed,  at  the  suc- 
cessive slaughter  of  the  Albigenses,  the  Wal- 
denses,  the  Huguenots,  held  her  jubilees,  and 
claimed  that  the  church,  in  these  respective 
areas,  was  wholly  extinct;  but  she  did  not 
claim  at  any  period  that  the  church  was  also 
simultaneously  extinct  in  every  other  country 
subject  to  her  rule.  If  she  ever  did,  it  was 
falsely,  and  amid  the  contradiction  of  sur- 
rounding facts  and  existing  witnesses. 

But  when  she  shall  "Mil  them"  (according 
to  this  prophecy,)  "their  dead  bodies  shall  lie 
in  the  street  of  the  great  city,  which  spiritually 
is  called  Sodom,  and  Egypt,  where  also  our 
Lord  was  crucified;  and  they  of  the  people, 
and  kindreds,  and  tongues,  and  nations,  shall 
see  their  dead  bodies  three  days  and  a  half, 
and  shall  not  suffer  their  dead  bodies  to  be  put 
in  graves.  And  they  that  dwell  upon  the 
earth  shall  rejoice  over  them  and  make  merry, 
and  shall  send  gifts  one  to  another,  because 

24 


278  1SHMAEL   AND    THE  CHURCH. 

these  two  prophets  tormented  them  that  dwelt 
on  the  earth."* 

Thus,  when  she  shall  actually  hill  them, — 
when  this  hour  of  her  final  triumph  shall  have 
fully  come, — she  is  to  survey  the  whole  field 
at  once,  and,  during  three  years  and  a  half, 
claim  on  the  clearest  evidence — evidence 
wholly  uncontradicted  and  universally  con- 
vincing— that  they  are  no  more.  On  the 
highway  of  the  great  spiritual  city — her  great 
ecclesiastical  domain,  covering  ten  kingdoms 
with  its  mighty  hierarchy  and  ghostly  rule, 
the  broad  frequented  thoroughfare  of  peoples 
and  nations,  kindreds  and  tongues,  a  spectacle 
for  the  whole  world  to  gaze  at — their  bodies 
shall  lie  exposed  to  every  eye,  shall  be  spurned 
by  every  foot. 

The  jubilee  also,  like  the  massacre,  shall  be 
universal.  It  shall  not,  as  heretofore,  confine 
itself  to  Italy,  but  shall  comprehend  all  the 
kingdoms  subject  to  Papal  domination.  If  an 
event  like  this  had  ever  occurred,  its  great  publi- 
city, as  well  as  its  unprecedented  cruelty,  would 
have  so  chronicled  it  in  the  annals  of  every 
age,  that  to  have  questioned  it  now  would  have 
been  simply  absurd,  and  quite  impossible. 


*  Hev.  xi. 


THE   WITNESSES.  279 

And,  if  the  witnesses  have  not  yet  been 
slain,  we  cannot  now,  at  this  late  day,  go 
back  to  the  seventh  century  in  commencing 
our  computation  of  the  prophetic  interval 
under  consideration. 

But  not  only  has  the  event  not  taken  place 
as  described  in  the  prophecy:  the  witnesses 
themselves  are  witnesses  against  this  conclu- 
sion, since  they  still  exist,  still  prophesy  in 
sackcloth,  in  all  Papal  countries, — are  still  de- 
pressed, disfranchised,  and  sorrowful.  A  single 
glance  at  the  state  of  the  Protestant  church 
in  Europe  must  satisfy  the  most  incredulous 
that  her  present  state  is  more  deplorable  by 
far  than  it  was  three  hundred  years  ago.  But 
if  the  death  and  resurrection  of  her  witnesses 
has  taken  place  long  since,  why  does  she  still 
prophesy  in  sackcloth, — since,  when  the  de- 
parted life  revives  in  the  dead  bodies  of  the 
fallen  witnesses  and  they  stand  upon  their 
feet,  the  sackcloth  drops  from  them  and  they 
are  ever  after  exalted  to  heaven  ?  The  death 
and  resurrection  of  the  witnesses  is  therefore, 
we  conclude,  an  event  yet  to  come;  and  the 
state  of  things  in  Europe,  according  to  this 
view  of  the  question,  must  become  worse  than 
it  now  is  for  Zion  before  it  can  become  better. 

The  causes  and  tendencies  of  recent  convul- 


280  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

sions,  and  of  the  present  precarious  peace,  in- 
vest themselves  therefore  with  great  religious 
as  well  as  political  interest,  and  awaken  an  in- 
tense desire  in  all  to  know  what  are  to  be  the 
events  which  are  now  imminent  in  the  out- 
goings of  that  Providence  whose  footfalls 
and  marshallings  are  already  shaking  the 
earth,  "and  with  fear  of  change  perplexing 
monarchs." 


CHAPTER  XXXIII. 

ISHMAEL   AND   THE  WESTERN   ALLIES. 

"Proud  Saracen,  pollute  no  more 
The  shrines  by  martyrs  built  of  yore ! 
From  each  wild  mountain's  trackless  crown 
In  vain  thy  gloomy  castles  frown." 

Warton. 

The  invaders  of  the  empire  from  the  North, 
inured  to  hardness,  though  they  prostrated, 
nevertheless  renovated,  the  kingdoms  of  the 
West.  The  effeminate  offspring  of  patrician 
luxury,  mingling  their  blood  with  the  rude 
conquerors  of  their  shattered  states,  restored 
again  the  bone  and  muscle  of  earlier  and 
better  days. 

But  the  Eastern  division  of  the  empire  lost 
its  Asiatic  provinces  without  experiencing  a 
corresponding  benefit.  A  humanity  already 
greatly  deteriorated  still  continued  to  mingle 
blood  with  blood,  and  to  carry  down  among 
the  Grecians  a  progressive  physical  and  social 
degeneracy.  Asiatic  Greece  was  absorbed  by 
Ishmael.  In  the  wreck  of  its  cities  and  pro- 
vinces there  originated  an  amalgamation  of 

24*  S  281 


282      ISHMAEL  AND  THE  CHURCH. 

its  races  with  their  Arab  conquerors.  This 
counteracted  for  generations  the  tendency  to 
national  weakness,  and  gave  to  the  empire  of 
the  caliphs  its  prestige  and  stability.  Its 
races,  possessed  of  a  mightier  manhood,  were 
born  to  dominion. 

While,  therefore,  the  West  and  the  South, 
the  Latins  and  the  Saracens,  rose  up  in  a 
renovated  humanity,  the  East,  isolated  by  her 
position  and  repelled  by  her  antipathies,  was 
not  reached  or  benefited  by  the  rushing  and 
restless  tides  of  social  change  or  of  physical  re- 
generation. Greece,  the  world's  admired  centre 
of  learning  and  refinement,  though  possessed  of 
every  other  advantage  over  the  Latins  and  the 
Saracens,  was  nevertheless  utterly  incapable  of 
self-defence, — was  daily  tending,  by  the  opera- 
tion of  an  irresistible  law,  to  national  decay 
and  political  ruin. 

In  her  rise  to  supremacy  in  the  fourth 
century,  her  Constantinople,  at  that  time  the 
world's  proud  imperial  capital,  became  also  the 
metropolis  of  Christendom  and  assumed  a  pro- 
tectorate over  all  its  sacred  places.  The  de- 
cline of  Rome  transferred  ultimately  to  her 
the  imperial  purple  and  gave  to  her  the  tem- 
porary supremacy.  This  she  feebly  grasped, 
and  therefore  but  briefly  held.     The  revived 


THE   WESTERN  ALLIES.  283 

energy  o  the  Latins  oppressed  her  effeminacy, 
and  the  Eoman  bishop  at  every  turn  of  fortune 
and  of  controversy  came  up  in  the  ascendant, 
obtaining  ultimately  from  Constantinople,  and 
by  imperial  proclamation,  the  spiritual  lord- 
ship over  the  East  and  the  West. 

Just  at  this  juncture  also,  and  most  unfortu- 
nately for  the  Greek  church,  Ishmael  gained 
his  terrible  nationality  and  rushed  fiercely 
from  the  desert.  Greece  could  not  resist;  and 
Asia  was  lost  to  the  church  and  to  Caesar. 

The  holy  places,  sacred  to  the  memory  of 
Christ  and  his  apostles,  from  this  unpropitious 
hour  became  the  objects  of  a  painful  interest. 
Images  were  broken,  altars  subverted,  cruci- 
fixes trampled,  and  the  holy  sepulchre  itself 
marred  and  defiled. 

The  Crusades  of  the  Middle  Ages  were  under- 
taken to  retrieve  these  losses,  and  to  restore  to 
the  church  a  spot  so  blended  in  her  visions 
with  all  that  now  to  her  was  most  awful  and 
most  tender  in  her  recollections  of  her  Lord. 

The  Crusaders  obtained  and  held  disputed 
possession  of  the  Holy  Land,  and  protected  it 
from  Moslem  profanation;  but  it  was  a  hope- 
less and  a  wasteful  protectorate.  An  uncon- 
genial climate  and  the  scimitar  thinned  the 
ranks  of  Christian  armies,  deprived  them  of 


284  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

their  conquests,  and  brought  back  upon  mis- 
guided Europe  a  bloody  retaliation.  In  the 
event  she  herself  was  invaded,  the  last  of  the 
Caesars  fell,  and  to  this  day  "the  crescent  sur- 
mounts the  cross  on  the  dome  of  St.  Sophia." 

Napoleon  I.,  though  he  arose  in  the  first 
instance  as  a  popular  leader,  discovered  the 
highway  to  supreme  power  to  be  through  the 
church.  His  crown  must  come  from  papal 
hands,  his  legitimacy  from  the  unction  of 
St.  Peter,  the  stability  of  his  throne  from  the 
banks  of  the  Tiber.  He  hence  became  a  true 
son  of  the  church,  catered  to  her  superstitions, 
and  merited  her  blessing  by  the  protection 
which  he  extended  over  her  holy  places  at 
Jerusalem. 

When  he,  however,  fell  before  the  stern  Mus- 
covite, the  protectorate  fell  also  into  other 
hands, — was  assumed  by  the  czar,  who,  with- 
out contradiction,  has  been  permitted  to  retain 
it  till  recently,  as  though  it  had  been  ever  his, 
held  in  his  own  right,  and  that  by  common 
consent.  In  executing  the  commission  con- 
ferred in  this  protectorate,  he  gradually  en- 
croached upon  the  territories  of  the  Ottomans. 

The  Sublime  Porte,  cognizant  of  the  con- 
tinued desecration  of  the  holy  places,  was 
nevertheless  appealed  to  in  vain  by  Nicholas. 


TIIE  WESTERN   ALLIES.  285 

Its  subjects  could  not  be  restrained.  The 
antipathies  of  Ishmael  to  churches,  altars, 
crucifixes,  holy  places,  and  holy  things,  were 
legitimate,  were  ever  conscientious  and  on  a 
religious  account.  He  was  ever  the  sworn  and 
bloody  foe  of  idolatry.  In  every  place,  and 
especially  at  Jerusalem,  the  venerated  remains 
of  a  Christian  antiquity,  held  most  inviolably 
sacred  by  the  church,  was  ever  made  the  object 
of  his  most  implacable  rage  and  violence. 

This  it  is  which  has  unhinged  the  world's 
harmonies  for  more  than  twelve  hundred  years. 
In  the  Middle  Ages  it  roused  Europe  to  the 
wars  of  the  cross,  and  that  by  outrages  com- 
mitted on  devotees  peaceably  though  super- 
stitiously  gathered  around  the  sepulchre  of 
their  Lord.  The  indignities  also  practised 
upon  the  bishop  of  the  Greek  church  and  the 
Russian  consul  at  Jerusalem  on  Easter  Monday, 
supplemented  as  it  was  by  a  forcible  transfer 
of  stipulated  sanctuary  privileges  from  the 
Greek  to  the  Latin  Christians,  led  to  the 
recent  war  of  the  Allies. 

In  a.d.  1673,  it  was  conceded  to  Louis  XI Y. 
by  the  sultan,  in  a  treaty,  "that  the  King  of 
France  be  recognised  the  sole  protector  of 
the  Catholics  in  the  East,"  Secondly,  "that 
churches  be  erected  or   repaired  without   the 


286  ISHMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

previous  authorization  of  the  Porte."  Thirdly, 
"  that  the  holy  shrines  shall  be  restored  to  the 
possession  of  the  Latins,  because  they  were 
conquered  by  Frenchmen  in  the  Crusades." 
But  subsequent  changes  had  materially  altered 
the  relations  of  parties,  and  the  holy  places, 
in  the  judgment  of  many,  had,  both  in  justice 
and  in  fact,  fallen  back  again  to  the  Greek 
protectorate. 

In  a.d.  1850,  France  revived  her  claim, 
based  upon  the  above-named  expired  treaty; 
but  Napoleon  was  then  a  feeble  recency  in  war 
and  in  diplomacy,  and  the  threatening  attitude 
of  Nicholas  led  him  to  waive  for  the  moment 
his  claim. 

In  the  subsequent  agitations  of  the  questions 
at  issue,  France  appears  as  the  protector  of  the 
Latin,  and  Kussia  of  the  Greek  Christians 
within  the  Turkish  dominions.  The  war  had 
placed  Turkey  under  the  control  of  the  Allies; 
and,  while  it  was  claimed  "that  no  Power 
shall  claim  the  right  of  exercising  an  official 
protectorate  over  the  subjects  of  the  Sublime 
Porte,  no  matter  to  which  rite  they  belong," 
France  effectually  protected  the  Catholic 
Greeks  in  Turkey. 

The  sultan  had,  on  one  occasion,  determined 
to  expel  all  Greeks  not  his  own  subjects  from 


TIIE   WESTERN   ALLIES.  287 

Constantinople.  It  was  on  account  of  the  ani- 
mosity of  the  Greeks  against  the  Turks.  It  was 
normal,  it  was  universal ;  and  no  Greek  could  be 
trusted,  whether  he  belonged  to  the  one  or  the 
other  rite.  France  at  once  demanded  that  all 
Greeks  belonging  to  the  Catholic  church  should 

CD  O 

be  made  an  exception  to  the  rule.  The  sultan 
refused  to  make  any  exception.  "  The  French 
ambassador,"  says  the  London  Times,  "there- 
upon took  fire,  and  demanded  nothing  short 
of  the  dismissal  of  the  Turkish  ministers,  on 
whom  the  conduct  of  the  war  and  the  ex- 
istence of  the  empire  depend,  and  vowed  that 
if  satisfaction  were  refused  he  should  em- 
bark with  his  whole  embassy  in  forty-eight 
hours." 

Thus  the  depression  of  the  Greek  and  the 
exaltation  of  the  Catholic  church  followed  in 
the  train  of  the  alliance,  and  signalized  the 
decline  of  the  Russian  protectorate. 

If  a  quarrel  arose  at  Jerusalem  between  the 
Greek  and  Latin  Christians,  the  Latins  were 
protected ;  the  Greeks  had  no  one  to  speak  on 
their  behalf. 

France  obtained  a  firman  to  build  a  church 
in  the  Holy  Land.  The  Pacha  of  Jerusalem 
is  instructed  to  purchase  and  present  a  piece 
of  ground  for  the  building.    A  similar  applica- 


288  ISHMAEL  AND   THE   CHURCH. 

tion,  formally  made   by  Prince  MenschikofF, 
was  refused. 

The  Archbishop  of  Paris  predicts  that,  in  the 
event  of  the  overthrow  of  Kussia,  the  dominion 
of  the  Papacy  will  become  universal. 

"  It  is,"  says  the  Koman  archbishop  in  Que- 
bec, "  the  cause  of  the  church  which  has  been 
committed  to  the  armies  of  France  and  Eng- 
land; and  their  success  while  defending  Turkey 
against  an  unjust  aggression  on  the  part  of  the 
enemy  wTill,  at  the  same  time,  secure  to  the 
church  the  twofold  advantage  of  diminishing 
schismatical  influence  in  the  East,  and  of  esta- 
blishing Catholicism  on  a  more  favourable  and 
independent  footing." 

In  the  peace-negotiations,  first  and  last,  the 
phenomena  that  attended  each  step  were  their 
ever-favourable  phase  toward  the  progress  of 
the  Latin  church. 

"  Letters  from  Home  state  that  the  Pope  had 
received  from  the  czar  an  autograph  letter 
which  announced  the  restoration  of  four  Ko- 
man Catholic  bishops  in  Poland,  and  the  esta- 
blishment of  six  others  in  Kussia." 

Constantinople  has  ever  been,  and  yet  is,  the 
great  and  dreaded  rival  of  Koine.  The  Latin 
sect  is  but  a  secession  from  the  Greek.  The 
Greek   is   the   mother-church.      The    fall  of 


THE   WESTERN    ALLIES.  289 

Constantinople,  in  a.d.  1453,  was  the  fall  of 
Koine's  great  competitor,  and  the  dawn  of 
her  most  hopeful  processes  of  proselytism  and 
absorption. 

Her  missionaries  are  ever  active  throughout 
the  East,  and  their  successes  by  no  means  in- 
considerable. Her  plans  have  been  most  com- 
prehensive ;  the  anticipated  results  most  mag- 
nificent. Her  sober  attempts  after  universal, 
temporal,  and  spiritual  rule — the  mastery  over 
the  souls  and  the  bodies  of  men— surpass  the 
wildest  dreams  of  earthly  ambition.  These,  in 
her  darkest  reverses,  have  never  been  inter- 
mitted. In  all  the  alternations  of  her  change- 
ful fortunes,  during  the  revolutions  of  ages,  she 
has  not,  for  a  single  moment,  lost  sight  of  her 
proudest  aspirations ;  and  while  she  retains  her 
organic  life  she  never  will. 

The  policy  of  every  cabinet  which  she 
rules  must,  whatever  other  interest  it  secures, 
secure  her  ultimate  triumph.  The  Anglican, 
the  Protestant,  and  the  Greek  Christians  are 
alike  her  rivals,  and  they  are  alike  marked  for 
the  sacrifice.  The  emperor  in  her  interest  is 
alike  the  enemy  of  them  all.  His  compliant 
protectorate  will  spread  its  ages  over  the  Latin 
church,  and  over  that  only.  The  toleration 
of  Christians  of  all  sects  by  the  Porte  is  one 

25 


290  ISHMAEL   AND   THE  CHURCH. 

thing;  the  protectorate  of  Napoleon  is  quite 
another. 

The  battle  of  Navarino,  that  broke  the  power 
of  Turkey,  placed  that  power  completely  at 
the  mercy  of  her  natural  foe;  and  her  remark- 
able preservation  to  the  present  day  can  only 
be  accounted  for  by  an  inquiry  into  the  ob- 
vious policies  of  Home. 

Turkey  has  found  grace  in  her  sight,  that 
Greece  might  perish.  The  fall  of  Turkey  before 
the  successful  encroachments  of  Kussia  would 
have  restored  the  Greek  empire,  and  would 
have  placed  at  the  head  of  its  revived  fortunes 
a  race  surpassed  by  no  other  in  ambition  or  in 
battle ;  and  the  contest  so  long  and  so  advan- 
tageously conducted  against  the  Greek  church 
would  have  ended  in  defeat  and  shame.  The 
czar  is,  therefore,  beaten  back,  and  the  hated 
Turk  fostered,  that  the  dominions  of  the  Otto- 
mans may  be  kept  open  to  the  continued  prose- 
lytisms  of  Home. 

The  overthrow  of  Russia,  in  the  opinion  of 
the  Archbishop  of  Paris,  will  open  the  way  for 
universal  Papal  ascendency. 

Turkey  is  the  packhorse  of  France  and  Italy; 
and  when  she  ceases  to  be  of  any  further  use 
she  will  be  turned  out  upon  the  common  to 
die. 


THE   WESTERN   ALLIES.  291 

England,  in  her  solicitude  for  her  Eastern 
possessions,  was  drawn  into  a  war  against  her 
Anglican  establishment  and  her  Protestantism. 
Every  blow  of  her  sturdy  arm,  while  it  weak- 
ened the  Greek  church,  served  to  strengthen 
her  far  mightier  foe,  and  to  put  in  jeopardy 
more  and  more  her  own  precious  faith. 


CHAPTER  XXXIY. 

ROME — HER     ASPIRATIONS. 


;  The  woman  which  thou  sawest  is  that  great  city  which  reigneth 
over  the  kings  of  the  earth." — St.  John. 


The  following  pages,  so  far  as  they  relate 
to  unfulfilled  prophecy,  are  introduced  to  close 
my  theme.  I  do  not  set  them  down  as  certain- 
ties, but  as  my  speculative  opinions  on  debat- 
able questions; — questions  whose  satisfactory 
solution  must  ever  be  left  to  the  revelations  of 
time. 

How  striking  the  picture  of  the  combined 
weakness  and  strength  of  Rome!  She  is  a 
woman,  most  delicate  and  frail;  but  she  is 
supported  by  a  monster  of  enormous  propor- 
tions, on  whose  back  she  rides,  and  whose 
crowned  horns  sustain  and  adorn  her  glitter- 
ing tiara.  She  was  called  to  judgment  at 
Constance,  sat  weak  and  defenceless  before  the 
tribunal  that  arraigned  her,  but  rode  away 
at  last  triumphant  over  her  foes, — over  the 
ashes  of  Huss  and  Jerome,  and  with  princes 

292 


ROME.  293 

at  her  bridle-rein.  Napoleon  I.  lorded  it 
over  her  in  the  verdancy  of  his  career,  but 
bowed  his  neck  to  her  iron  yoke  at  last. 
She  held  her  soft  palm  on  the  gateway  of 
legitimacy.  Her  unction  made  sacred  the  per- 
sons of  kings  and  emperors.  She  controlled 
the  opinions  of  his  subjects  and  of  Europe; 
and  their  veneration  for  him,  on  a  religious 
account,  was  to  him  every  thing.  She  gave 
him  his  crown;  he,  in  his  turn,  supported 
her  ecclesiastical  supremacy.  He  became 
strong  in  her  strength;  she  became  strong 
in  his. 

His  act  in  taking  the  crown  out  of  the 
hand  of  the  pontiff  and  placing  it  on  his  own 
head,  though  it  tended  to  deceive  the  vulgar, 
changed  not  the  fact  respecting  his  imperial 
homage  and  servility.  He  became  religious 
from  policy.  He  supported  and  carried  the 
Pope,  that  he  might  the  more  securely  support 
and  carry  his  crown. 

The  Revolution  of  1848  exalted  the  present 
imperial  despot  to  the  throne  of  his  illustrious 
uncle.  This  same  revolution  made  his  Holi- 
ness a  fugitive,  until  the  bayonets  of  French- 
men restored  and  supported  his  fallen  strength. 
And,  indeed,  from  the  time  that  Phocas,  Pepin, 
and  Charlemagne  gave  him  the  mastery,  until 
25* 


294       ISHMAEL  AND  THE  CHURCH. 

this  day,  his  strength  has  ever  been  in  the 
support  of  Catholic  princes. 

There  is  nothing  abnormal  in  the  inter- 
ference of  foreign  troops  in  the  affairs  of 
Italy.  It  has  ever  been  the  fact;  and  that 
fact  has  ever  been  one  striking  illustration 
of  the  prophecy.  The  Pope  is  in  himself  a 
cipher,  but  he  is  strong  in  the  power  of  his 
imperial  supporters. 

Where  is  the  mighty  Protestantism  of  the 
League  of  Passau?  The  throne  of  the  sove- 
reign pontiff  toppled  before  it,  and  his  im- 
perial defender  sought  refuge  in  a  compliant 
treaty  from  its  iron  grasp.  But  look  now  on 
that  broad  field  of  its  triumph,  and  where  is 
its  power?  Let  the  martyred  blood  of  a  mil- 
lion Huguenots  respond  from  the  Rhone !  Let 
Catholicized  Geneva  answer.  Let  Holland, 
once  the  keystone  in  the  arch  that  supported 
the  great  Reformation,  reply  from  amid  the 
ruins  of  her  crumbling  towers.  Let  Hungary 
answer,  now  hung  up  "  like  the  empty  and 
bleeding  skin  of  a  slaughtered  victim."  Let 
Prussia  answer,  the  last  stronghold  left, — 
bearded  now,  and  reluctantly  admitted  to 
the  peace-councils  of  the  Allies  at  Paris 

Such  are  some  of  the  melancholy  shadow- 
ings  of  the  recent  war,  whose  thunders  have 


ROME.  205 

been  breaking  along  the  confines  of  two  ages, 
heralding  the  outgoing  of  the  one  and  the  in- 
coming of  the  other. 

Ishmael,  with  a  piece  of  bread  and  a  bottle 
of  water,  turns  again  his  pale  face  toward  the 
wilderness.  The  death-wail  of  expiring  Greece 
is  heard  on  the^coast  of  the  Black  Sea.  The 
protectorate  has  fallen  to  Napoleon  and  to 
Rome.  Protestant  Prussia  has  been  menaced 
on  the  Rhine  and  scorned ;  and  she  is  looking 
this  way  and  that  way,  like  one  at  his  wits' 
end.  England  likewise — Protestant  England 
— has  been  shocked  at  her  successive  mis- 
fortunes. Her  lion  slinks  to  his  lair,  while 
the  sea  and  the  waves  thereof  are  roaring,  and 
"men's  hearts  are  failing  them  for  fear  and  for 
looking  after  those  things  that  are  coming  on 
the  earth." 

The  final  war  upon  the  witnesses,  it  is  with 
reason  believed,  is  just  at  hand.  The  ter- 
mination of  the  late  war  has  not  settled  the 
"  Italian  question."  It  is  a  volcano  whose 
smothered  tones  will  probably  soon  find  utter- 
ance and  amaze  the  world.  The  witnesses 
must  fall.  The  beast  shall  overcome  and  kill 
them.  Even  their  wild  halls  of  nature's  ma- 
sonry in  the  Alps  shall  soon  be  deserted,  and 
their  Northern  and  insular  retreats  refuse  them 


296  ISHMAEL  AND   THE   CHURCH. 

both  life  and  sepulture.  Across  the  left  foot- 
print of  the  angel  disastrous  twilight  is  sweep- 
ing, and  thunderings  and  lightnings  and  voices 
and  great  hail  are  deepening  the  gloom  of  the 
descending  night. 

Such  are  the  visions  that,  since  the  Bevo- 
lution  of  1848,  flit  alike  athwart  the  political 
and  the  prophetic  horizon.  They  are  of  pale 
and  of  expiring  things ;  of  old  and  of  worn- 
out  confederacies  and  nationalities.  Their 
death-groans  reach  tis  even  across  the  ocean, 
and  their  vanishing  forms  are  fast  disappearing 
behind  the  shadows  of  an  everlasting  evening. 

They  are  also  of  more  hopeful  things, — of 
another  age,  whose  young  life  is  already  coming 
in  on  the  coasts  of  a  New  World.  To  it  the 
footprint  of  the  angel  in  the  sea  led  the  way, 
and  in  it  they  sing  the  song  of  Moses  the  ser- 
vant of  God,  and  the  song  of  the  Lamb.  To  it, 
also,  nations  are  turning  their  eye,  and  "watch 
for  it  as  they  that  watch  for  the  morning." 

A  few  short  years  are  yet  assigned,  according 
to  our  reckoning  of  prophetic  time,  to  accom- 
plish the  predicted  death  of  the  witnesses.  The 
wrongs  and  oppressions  of  ages  shall  then  have 
reached  their  full.  Their  testimony  shall  then 
have  been  finished,  and  their  garb  of  sackcloth 
dyed  in  the  blood  of  a  universal  massacre. 


ROME.  297 

In  the  streets  of  that  great  ecclesiastical 
city — that  city  steeped  in  the  lust  of  Sodom, 
dark  with  Egyptian  cruelty,  the  spot  also  of 
our  Lord's  perpetual  crucifixion  in  the  sacrifice 
of  the  mass — shall  the  fearful  tragedy  openly 
proceed,  and  reveal  to  all  its  scenes  of  remorse- 
less and  deliberate  murder. 

This  awful  event  precedes  the  passing  away 
of  the  second  woe;  and,  judging  from  the 
rapidly-declining  star  of  Ishmael,  (if  we  had 
no  other  guide,)  the  catastrophe  must  be  re- 
garded as  nigh, — yea,  even  at  the  doors. 

The  prophet,  however,  skirts  the  gloomy  pic- 
ture with  a  fringe  of  light.  This  sudden  and 
destructive  revival  of  papal  oppression  is  to  be 
brief  and  final, — the  last  fatal  eruption  of  the 
spiritual  Etna, — its  unexpected  and  its  suicidal 
victory.  And  though  no  Cromwell  then  shall 
live  to  expostulate  and  threaten, — no  surviving 
Milton  cry, 

u  Avenge,  0  Lord,  thy  slaughter' d  saints,  whose  bones 
Lie  scatter' d  on  the  Alpine  mountains  cold/' — 

yet  in  the  short  space  of  three  years  and  a 
half  the  witnesses  shall  themselves  revive  and 
open  again  their  testimony  in  cottages  and 
palaces,  and  amid  the  demon-revels  of  the 
amazed  Antichrist. 


298       ISHMAEL  AND  THE  CHURCH. 

And,  ere  she  shall  recover  from  her  despair, 
or  he  able  to  rally  her  forces,  unexpected 
political  confederacies  shall  form  around  the 
joyous  witnesses  and  call  them  up  to  places  of 
honour  and  security. 

And  in  the  same  hour,  simultaneously,  the 
tenth  part  of  the  city  shall  fall,  and  in  one 
out  of  the  ten  kingdoms  despotism  find  a 
bloody  grave.  Such  is  the  prophetic  picture 
of  the  antecedents  and  concomitants  of  the 
passing  away  of  the  second  woe. 


CHAPTER  XXXV. 

THE     FALL     OF     ISLAMISM. 

"  This  is  the  Moslem's  hour  of  prayer ! 
'Twas  Judah's  ouce ;  but  fane  and  priest, 
Altar  and  sacrifice,  have  ceased." 

Montgomery. 

The  second  woe  reached  its  height  in  the 
fall  of  Constantinople.  And  when  the  Ottoman 
shall  relinquish  his  European  conquests  and 
retire  to  his  old  dominions  in  the  Euphrates, 
the  woe  shall  have  passed  away. 

The  Ottomans  had  a  national  being  before 
they  became  a  woe ;  and  when  they  cease  to 
be  a  woe  they  do  not  also  necessarily  cease  to 
be  a  nation.  Their  nationality,  it  is  believed, 
indeed,  will  end;  but  it  will  be  at  another 
time  and  place  than  the  present  or  than 
Europe.  When  the  return  of  expatriated  Isaac 
shall  be  resisted  by  them  in  Asia,  then  shall 
they  "  fall  without  hand/'  or  by  the  immediate 
interposition  of  Heaven.  Rejected  from  the 
patrimony  of  Isaac  by  the  great  Proprietor  of 
heaven  and  earth,  they  in  after-ages  invaded 

299 


300  ISHMAEL  AND   THE   CHURCH. 

and  obtained  it  by  violence;  but,  as  their  illus- 
trious father  fell  in  his  first  contest  in  the  tent 
of  Abraham,  and  Sarah's  bitter  words  prevailed 
to  make  the  scoffer  an  outcast,  so  in  the  final 
issue  he  shall  fall  again,  and  that  hopelessly, 
before  the  better  destiny  of  his  injured  brother. 

The  following  prophecy  seems  descriptive 
of  the  event : — "  The  sixth  angel  poured  out 
his  vial  upon  the  great  river  Euphrates,  and 
the  water  thereof  was  dried  up,  that  the  way 
of  the  kings  of  the  East  might  be  prepared."* 

The  Euphrates  flowed  under  the  walls  and 
through  the  midst  of  the  ancient  Babylon,  fur- 
nishing the  city  with  an  abundant  supply  of 
water,  and  enabling  it  to  hold  out  indefinitely 
in  a  siege.  Cyrus  dried  up  tins  bed  of  the 
river  by  digging  new  channels,  into  which  he 
turned  the  current,  and  opened  thus,  under  the 
walls,  an  ample  passage  for  his  invading  army. 

Having  taken  the  city  by  this  stratagem,  he 
made  it  the  capital  of  the  Persian  empire. 
From  that  time  the  Babylonian  ceased  to 
exist, — dried  up  like  the  channel  of  its  river. 
It  became  henceforth  absorbed  and  lost  in  that 
of  the  Persian. 

Hence,  in  Scripture  parlance,  the  drying  up 
of  the  Euphrates  had  both  a  literal  and  a  figu- 

*  Rev.  xvi.  12. 


TIIE   FALL   OF   ISLAMISM.  301 

rative  meaning.  According  to  the  latter,  it 
signified  the  amalgamation  with  their  con- 
querors of  the  people  that  might  at  any  time 
be  in  possession  of  the  ancient  Chaldea.  The 
Babylonian  empire  was  lost  in  the  Persian; 
the  Persian  in  the  Saracenic ;  the  Saracenic  in 
the  Turkish.  The  prophet,  in  the  above-quoted 
passage,  points  to  a  period  in  which  the  last- 
named  occupier  of  this  renowned  site  of  Ori- 
ental despotism  is  to  take  the  course  and 
share  the  fate  of  its  several  predecessors. 

The  Ottomans  rose  to  power  on  the  Eu- 
phrates. They  in  after-ages  made  Constanti- 
nople their  capital.  They  have,  however,  never 
lost  their  original  territorial  possessions  on  the 
Euphrates.  And  when  in  coming  years  they 
lose  their  hold  on  Europe  and  return  again 
to  this  first  and  last  stronghold  of  their  na- 
tional existence,  they  are  but  to  return  home 
to  die. 

According  to  this  view  of  the  subject,  the 
second  woe  and  the  sixth  vial  relate  to  dif- 
ferent events,  but  both  belong  successively  to 
the  history  of  the  same  people.  The  Ottomans 
rise  as  the  Euphratean  horsemen,  retain  this 
designation  appropriately  ever  after,  and  return 
again  at  the  time  of  the  end  to  find  in  this 
very   region  their   national   sepulchre.      The 

26 


302  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

passing  away  of  the  second  woe,  it  is  obvious, 
would  not  necessarily  involve  any  more  than 
the  exclusion  of  the  Turks  from  Europe;  since 
it  became  the  second  woe  when  the  Turks, 
loosed  from  their  restraints  in  the  Euphrates, 
invaded  Europe  and  became  masters  of  the 
Eastern  capital.  When,  therefore,  they  shall 
retire  again  to  their  original  domain  in  Asia, 
the  second  woe  will  have  passed  away. 

But  in  the  effusion  of  the  sixth  vial  there 
is  more  indicated  than  the  passing  away  of  a 
woe> — the  termination  of  a  scourge  to  Chris- 
tendom. It  intimates  that  the  very  people 
composing  that  woe  are  thereafter  no  longer 
to  be  reckoned  among  the  nations;  that, 
when  the  angel  shall  empty  the  vial  and  spread 
his  cloud,  the  pestilential  drops  that  shall  con- 
dense and  fall  shall  bedew  the  pale  brow  of 
the  expiring  Ishmael  and  prove  fatal  to  his 
very  being.  His  great  national  artery  shall 
cease  to  flow,  and  his  succession  be  cut  off  by 
pestilence  or  war,  or  by  amalgamation,  and 
disappear  as  perfectly  as  a  river  whose  channel 
becomes  dry, — the  future  field  for  the  shepherd 
and  the  reaper. 

It  is  a  reasonable  conclusion,  also,  that,  as  the 
two  great  antagonists  to  the  world's  social  and 
Christian  regeneration  have  a  distinct  descrip- 


TIIE    FALL   OF   ISLAMISM.  303 

tion  assigned  to  them  in  the  prophecy,  as  to 
their  origin  and  progress,  so,  not  only  the  one, 
but  also  the  other,  should  have  some  distinct 
indication  of  their  end. 

The  plagues  are  represented  as  preparing 
the  way  for  the  universal  prevalence  of  Christ's 
kingdom  on  earth  by  destroying  successively 
the  enemies  of  his  reign  in  the  West.  They 
sweep  on  in  close  proximity  until  they  fall 
finally  on  the  very  seat  of  the  beast,  crushing 
the  very  heart  of  despotism,  bearing  throne, 
sceptre,  and  tiara  into  the  chasm  that  had 
smouldered  for  ages  underneath  the  chair  of 
St.  Peter.  And  why  should  we  conclude  that 
another  and  an  equally-determined  enemy  of 
our  Lord  in  the  East  should  now  escape  ?  Did 
not  the  angel  lift  up  his  hand  to  heaven,  and 
swear  by  Him  that  liveth  forever  and  ever,  who 
created  the  heavens  and  the  things  that  therein 
are,  and  the  earth  and  the  things  that  therein 
are,  and  the  sea  and  the  things  that  are 
therein,  that  there  should  be  no  longer  any 
delay,  but  that  God  would  finish  the  mystery 
when  the  seventh  angel  should  begin  to  sound  ? 

The  seven  last  plagues  were  surely  the 
fulness  of  plagues  and  the  final  end  of  venge- 
ful visitations,  since  they  were  to  reach  and 
bear  away  every  stronghold  of  iniquity  from 


304      ISHMAEL  AND  THE  CHURCH. 

the  bosom  of  a  sin-burdened  world.  The 
direction  to  the  angels  to  pour  out  their  vials 
upon  the  earth,  as  they  were  to  prepare  the 
way  for  the  millennium,  must  have  compre- 
hended at  least  those  portions  of  the  earth  still 
at  that  time  covered  with  oppressive  govern- 
ments and  with  false  religions.  And  they 
could  not  therefore  have  taken  simply  the 
circuit  of  Europe  and  have  finally  paused  at 
Kome,  but  must  have  continued  on  their  way 
till  every  other  centre  of  evil  had  been  reached 
and  obliterated. 

The  first,  accordingly,  hovers  over  the  citadal 
of  political  despotism;  the  second,  over  the 
spot  where  vast  fleets  of  armed  oppressors  lie 
congregated  in  capacious  harbours,  ready  to 
spread  their  sails  and  dye  the  sea  with  Chris- 
tian blood;  the  third,  over  the  rivers  and 
fountains  of  the  Ligurian  Alps.  The  fourth 
pauses  just  over  the  broad  disc  of  the  imperial 
sun;  the  fifth,  over  the  chair  of  the  triple 
tyrant.  The  sixth  rests  not  till  he  reaches 
his  station  in  the  centre  of  Asia,  spreading  the 
plague-spot  over  the  doomed  sultanies.  And 
the  seventh  and  the  last  rises  above  the  prince  of 
the  power  of  the  air.  And,  since  all  evil  poten- 
cies are  included,  Islamism  must  also  in  these 
plagues  have  its  days  numbered  and  finished. 


THE   FALL   OF   ISLAMISM.  305 

That  this  plague  relates  to  Islamism  is  fur- 
ther evident,  since  the  object  for  which  the 
vial  is  poured  out  is  the  removal  of  the  great 
barrier  opposed  to  the  return  of  the  kings  of 
the  East.  The  Jews  were  opposed  in  their 
exodus  from  Egypt  by  the  Egyptians,  and  the 
Canaanites  crossed  their  march  and  obstructed 
their  entrance  into  the  Holy  Land.  The 
Mohammedans  of  the  present  day  would  be 
equally  certain  to  refuse  them  peaceable  pos- 
session of  their  own  country,  were  they  now  to 
commence  in  great  numbers  their  final  immi- 
gration into  it. 

Daniel,  in  the  eleventh  chapter  of  his  pro- 
phecy, is  believed  to  describe  tliis  very  opposi- 
tion; and  Zechariah,  (chapter  xiv.  verse  12,) 
the  consequent  miraculous  ruin  of  the  unblest 
foe  at  the  time  of  converted  Israel's  restoration. 

The  East  likewise  is  the  place  of  early  dawn. 
A  bright  star,  as  the  harbinger  of  the  sun, 
flames  on  the  forehead  of  the  morning.  Hence, 
it  has  been  common  among  sacred  writers  to 
describe  any  great  spiritual  or  literal  appear- 
ance of  our  Lord  by  a  reference  to  these 
agreeable  and  beautiful  objects.  His  advent 
is  called  the  "day-spring  from  on  high."  A 
star  seen  in  the  east  was  the  sign  of  it,  and  the 
guide  of  the  wise  men.     His  people  "  shine  as 

26* 


306  ISHMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

lights  in  the  world," — "are  made  kings  and 
priests  unto  God."  And  "the  kingdom  and 
the  greatness  of  the  kingdom  under  the  whole 
heaven  is  to  be  given  to  his  saints."  Of  this 
great  kingdom  Jerusalem  is  to  be  the  metro- 
polis, and  in  it  the  throne  and  the  succession 
is  to  be  restored  to  the  house  of  David. 

God  gave  the  Holy  Land  to  Abraham  and 
to  his  seed.  It  was  to  be  their  patrimony  and 
their  residence  while  the  sun  and  moon  should 
endure  and  rule  the  alternations  of  clay  and 
night.  From  it  they  were  temporarily  rejected 
for  their  criminal  rejection  of  their  Lord;  but 
the  very  sentence  containing  the  statement  of 
this  fact  implies  also  their  ultimate  restora- 
tion:— "Jerusalem  shall  be  trodden  down  of 
the  Gentiles  until  the  times  of  the  Gentiles 
shall  be  fulfilled." 

.First  in  the  series  of  instruments,  the  Ko- 
mans  trampled  with  iron  foot  this  sacred  and 
appropriated  heritage.  It  was  made  by  them 
the  theatre  of  war  and  bloodshed.  Other 
countries  could  be  held  in  subjection  in  the 
peaceable  exercise  of  power  by  these  conque- 
rors of  the  world;  but  this  could  not.  Its 
inhabitants  sternly  and  perseveringly  resisted. 
It  was  therefore  of  necessity  covered  with  gar- 
risons and  patrolled  and  harassed  by  exaspe- 


THE   FALL  OF   ISLAMISM.  307 

rated  soldiers.  Its  vineyards  and  gardens  were 
turned  into  places  for  camps,  battles,  and 
sieges ;  nor  would  the  infatuated  tribes  yield, 
until  their  cities  were  razed  to  the  ground  and 
they  themselves  slain  or  expatriated. 

Vfith  unbroken  resolution  and  a  terrible 
courage,  they  ever  forced  the  alternative  upon 
their  masters  of  either  abandoning  the  pro- 
vince altogether  or  of  holding  possession  of  it 
,  by  a  military  force.  It  could  not  therefore  be 
cultivated  and  made  fruitful  and  remunerative. 
Eome  could  but  cover  it  with  the  ruin  of  its 
Availed  towns,  break  down  its  hedges,  and  set 
an  armed  heel  on  its  desolate  bosom. 

The  Romans  lost  Palestine  just  as  they 
gained  it, — by  violence.  The  Saracens  suc- 
ceeded to  its  bloody  rule  in  their  turn,  and 
made  it  the  camping-ground  for  their  camels 
and  horses,  and  marred  every  remaining  ves- 
tige of  architectural  taste  or  cultivated  beauty. 
It  was  wrested  in  the  end  also  from  their 
hands,  and  that  by  a  new  race  of  conquerors, 
who,  strangers  alike  to  policy  or  humanity, 
roused  the  nations  to  the  wars  of  the  cross. 
It  was  held  alternately  by  one  or  the  other 
among  the  contending  parties  for  a  time;  but 
no  permanent  or  desirable  conquests  were 
made    by   any.      In    it    "  many    were    over- 


308  ISIIMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

thrown."  In  it,  for  ages,  Europe,  Asia,  and 
Africa  met,  not  to  plant  and  build  and  restore, 
but  to  pluck  up  and  cast  down  and  to  defile. 

But  the  Crusaders  had  their  day  and  their 
end.  Their  armies  perished  finally  around  the 
sepulchre  which  they  defended,  and  its  hoary 
walls  were  again  broken  by  the  hammer  of  the 
Moslem. 

A  new  foe  also  rushed  upon  the  plains  of 
Asia  from  the  distant  East.  Tamerlane,  in  his 
turn,  at  the  head  of  fifteen  hundred  thousand 
horse,  swept  and  trampled  the  devoted  patri- 
mony. He  too  had  his  day,  and  was  suc- 
ceeded by  the  Turks,  who,  to  this  hour,  efface 
its  beauty,  oppress  its  children,  and,  by  tread- 
ing it  down  with  Gentile  feet,  continue  to  fulfil 
the  prophecy. 

But  this  desolation  is  not  to  be  perpetual. 
That  land  is  yet  to  be  happy  and  prosperous. 
Its  wilderness  is  to  become  as  Eden,  its  desert  as 
the  garden  of  God.  The  language  in  the  text 
under  consideration  is  in  striking  contrast  with 
that  employed  to  describe  the  fate  of  Babylon, 
of  Rome,  and  of  the  tribes  of  Ishmael. 

Of  Babylon  it  is  said,  "  It  shall  never  be  in- 
habited. The  satyr  is  to  dance  in  its  streets, 
the  wild  beasts  of  the  island  are  to  cry  in  its 
desolate  houses,  and  dragons  in  its  pleasant 


TIIE   FALL   OF   ISLAMISM.  309 

chambers.  Never  more  in  it  shall  the  Arabian 
pitch  his  tent,  or  the  shepherd  make  his  fold. 
It  shall  be  a  possession  for  the  bittern  and  for 
pools  of  water."  Said  the  great  Avenger,  "  I 
will  sweep  it  with  the  besom  of  destruction." 

Eome  is  to  be  "utterly  burned  with  fire;" 
is  to  sink  and  disappear  in  the  volcano  that 
shall  open  under  her  walls  like  "a  millstone 
cast  into  the  sea."  The  significant  language 
of  the  angel  is,  as  she  is  seen  to  descend  into 
the  abyss,  "  She  shall  be  found  no  more  at 
all." 

The  tribes  of  Ishmael  are  likewise  to  perish, 
to  be  absorbed  like  a  river  lost  in  deep  basins 
opened  underneath  its  pebbly  bed. 

But  of  Jerusalem  it  is  said,  "She  shall  be 
trodden  down  of  the  Gentiles  until  the  times 
of  the  Gentiles  be  fulfilled ;"  and — surely  it  is 
here  intimated — not  after  that.  The  scene  is 
then,  we  justly  infer,  suddenly  to  change.  Her 
children  are  to  return,  to  be  "as  aforetime," 
and  the  voice  of  lamentation  and  the  shout  of 
the  oppressor  to  be  hushed  along  her  length- 
ened ruins. 

"  The  kings  of  the  East"  reside  in  the  East, 
but  in  exile,  as  is  suggested  by  the  drying  up 
of  a  river  to  prepare  the  way  for  their  ascension 
to  power, — the  removal  of  the  oppressors  from 


310      ISHMAEL  AND  THE  CHURCH. 

their  soil  that  its  legitimate  owners  and  right- 
ful rulers  may  occupy  it. 

The  Jews,  though  dispersed  into  every  land, 
are  to  be  found  in  greater  numbers  in  Eastern 
Asia  or  beyond  the  Euphrates  than  in  all  other 
places.  And,  when  the  tidings  of  their  gather- 
ing in  vast  bodies, — now  at  length  penitent  for 
their  rejection  of  their  Lord, — with  the  pur- 
pose of  resettling  in  their  long-lost  Canaan, 
shall  reach  the  ears  of  Ishmael,  the  cupidity 
and  the  enmity  of  the  outcast  and  the  usurper 
shall  revive,  "  and  he  shall  go  forth  with  great 
fury  to  destroy  and  utterly  to  make  away 
many;"  yet  "he  shall  come  to  his  end,  and 
none  shall  help  him."* 

And  when  "he  shall  plant  the  tabernacle 
of  his  palace  between  the  seas,"  (the  Medi- 
terranean and  the  Dead  Seas,)  "in  the  glori- 
ous holy  mountains,"  (of  Judea,) — when  his 
camp  shall  thus  cover  the  whole  frontier,  his 
troops  man  every  mountain-pass  and  walled 
town,  and  guard  every  avenue  to  the  Holy 
Land, — then  shall  be  seen  this  great  river,  the 
river  Euphrates,  stretching  from  shore  to  shore, 
and  sweeping  on  with  its  standards  and  tents 
and  turbans,  in  a  channel  deep,  broad,  and 

*  Dan.  xi.  44,  45. 


THE   FALL   OF   ISLAMISM.  311 

impassable,  between  returning  Israel  and  the 
land  of  their  fathers. 

And  it  is  this  river  over  which  the  angel 
hovers,  and  which  he  curtains  with  pestilen- 
tial wreaths  from  his  vial,  and  in  whose  sepul- 
chral basins  vanish  forever  the  Euphratean 
Pharaohs. 

"  This,"  says  Zechariah,  "  shall  be  the  plague 
wherewith  the  Lord  will  smite  all  the  people 
that  have  fought  against  Jerusalem;  Their 
flesh  shall  consume  away  while  they  stand 
upon  their  feet,  and  their  eyes  shall  consume 
away  in  their  holes,  and  their  tongue  shall 

consume  away  in  their  mouth And  so 

shall  be  the  plague  of  the  horse,  of  the  mule, 
of  the  camel,  and  of  the  ass,  and  of  all  the 
beasts  that  shall  be  in  these  tents,  as  this 
plague."  And,  as  the  Israelites  spoiled  the 
Egyptians,  so  in  this  event  they  shall  spoil  the 
smitten  Ottomans.  "The  wealth  of  all  the 
heathen  round  about  shall  be  gathered  to- 
gether, gold,  and  silver,  and  apparel,  in  great 

abundance In  that  day  shall  there  be 

upon  the  bells  of  the  horses,  Holiness  unto  the 
Lord." 

According  to  Ezekiel  xxxix.,  seven  months 
should  be  spent  in  burying  the  dead  on  the 
coasts  of  the  sea  to  cleanse  the  land ;  and  after 


312  ISIIMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

the  seven  months  the  authorities  "shall  sever 
out  men  of  continual  employment"  to  search 
for  stray  bodies  and  scattered  bones,  to  bury 
them;  and  the  passenger  who  in  his  tour 
through  the  land  should  chance  to  discover 
a  bone  should  be  required  to  "set  up  a  sign 
by  it,  till  the  buriers  should  bury  it," 

"And  at  that  time  shall  Michael  stand  up, 
the  great  prince  which  standeth  for  the  chil- 
dren of  thy  people :  and  there  shall  be  a  time 
of  trouble,  such  as  there  never  was  since  there 
was  a  nation  even  to  that  same  time ;  and  at 
that  time  thy  people  shall  be  delivered,  every 
one  that  shall  be  found  written  in  the  book."* 

Thus,  the  drama  that  opens  in  the  tent  of 
Abraham,  and  reopens  in  the  cave  of  Hara, 
closes  with  the  return  of  converted  Israel  to  his 
native  land.  A  dark  pall  drops  on  Mameluke 
and  Fatemite,  Saracen  and  Turk;  the  shadows 
of  the  long  night  roll  back,  and  the  latter-day 
glory  dawns,  after  the  lapse  of  intervening 
a^es,  on  the  renovated  fortunes  of  the  house  of 
David. 


*  Dan.  si.  1. 


CHAPTER  XXXYI. 

Isaac's  patrimony  restored. 


Nor  is  there — so  is  she  bereft — 
One  stone  upon  another  left. 
The  cross  and  crescent  shine  afar, 
But  where  is  Jacob's  natal  star?" 

Montgomery. 


In  the  sixth  chapter  of  the.  Epistle  to  the 
Romans,  Paul  insists  that  the  promise  to 
Abraham  and  to  his  seed  was  through  the 
righteousness  of  faith ;  by  which  principle  it 
was  that  Abraham  became  the  father  of  many 
nations.  Not  a  lineal  descent,  but  faith  in 
Christ,  constituted  any  one  a  member  of  the 
patriarch's  great  commonwealth. 

While  faith  thus  inducted  strangers  and 
aliens  and  made  them  fellow-citizens  of  the 
saints  and  of  the  household  of  faith,  the  want 
of  it  correspondingly  excluded  his  natural  de- 
scendants from  that  condition.  Ishmael,  the 
scoffer  and  the  persecutor,  though  a  child  of 
Abraham,  lost  by  his  impiety  all  connection 
with  the  covenants  of  promise.     The  question 

27  U  313 


314       ISHMAEL  AND  THE  CHURCH. 

of  legitimacy  was  not  mooted ;  it  was  his  un- 
belief, his  rejection  of  the  Messiah,  that  ex- 
cluded him. 

Esau,  likewise,  though  a  Hebrew,  was  re- 
jected. At  the  age  of  nineteen,  and  when 
capable  of  judging  and  acting  for  himself,  he 
despised  his  birthright,  rejected  Christ  in  that 
act,  and  God  rejected  him.  The  Ishmaelites 
and  the  Edomites,  therefore,  though  Hebrews 
by  blood,  were  not  Hebrews  in  truth,  since 
they  were  both  destitute  of  the  vital  principle 
of  Hebrew  nationality. 

The  Jews  also,  as  a  people,  ceased  to  be 
Jews  on  their  rejection  of  their  Messiah. 
"  He  is  a  Jew  who  is  one  inwardly."  The 
tribes  that  perished  in  the  wilderness  "  could 
not  enter  in,  because  of  unbelief."  Whole  na- 
tions, and  that  from  the  earliest  times,  had 
had  their  claims  to  Hebrew  nationality  vitiated 
on  this  principle.     Faith  was  essential  to  it. 

"  They  are  not  all  Israel  which  are  of  Israel, 
neither  because  they  are  the  seed  of  Abraham 
are  they  all  children,  'but  in  Isaac  shall  thy 
seed  be  called ;'  i.e.  they  which  are  the  children 
of  the  flesh  these  are  not  the  children  of  God, 
but  the  children  of  the  promise  are  counted  for 
the  seed." 

The  Gentiles,  also,  by  faith  become  Abra- 


Isaac's  patrimony.  315 

ham's  seed,  are  incorporated  into  his  great 
family,  are  heirs  according  to  the  pi-omise. 
They  change  their  relations  when  they  become 
Christians.  But  the  Jew,  in  becoming  a  Chris- 
tian, changes  not  his.  He  is  like  an  original 
branch  broken  from  the  olive-tree  and  then 
re-engrafted  into  the  parent  stock.  He  is 
naturally  an  heir;  and,  if  he  severs  his  connec- 
tion by  unbelief,  it  is  the  fault  of  his  conduct, 
not  of  his  blood. 

Hence,  the  Gentile  had  no  other  tie  of  na- 
tionality than  that  of  faith.  He,  like  a  wild 
branch,  was  grafted  in  among  the  natural 
branches,  and  with  them  partook  of  the  root 
and  fatness  of  the  tree.  The  converted  Gen- 
tiles were,  on  this  account,  called  by  the 
apostles  strangers  and  aliens,  who  by  their 
faith  had  become  fellow-citizens  of  the  saints 
and  of  the  household  of  faith.  The  lineal  Jew 
was,  therefore,  respected  as  one  having  a  na- 
tural precedence  over  the  Gentile.  To  his 
people  pertained  the  adoption,  the  glory,  the 
covenants,  the  service  of  Gocl,  the  promises, 
whose  were  the  fathers,  and  of  whom,  as  per- 
taining to  the  flesh,  Christ  came. 

Christ  was  a  Hebrew,  and  of  the  house  of 
David.  The  twelve  apostles  were  Jews.  To 
them,  as  such,  and  respected  as  believers,  it 


31 G  ISHMAEL   AND   THE    CHURCH. 

was  given  to  edit  the  New  Testament,  to 
gather  and  organize  the  Christian  church,  and 
in  it  to  remain  umpires  in  the  decision  of 
every  question  of  faith  and  practice.  Their 
recorded  utterances  are  hence  made  final  in 
every  debate  on  these  subjects  to  the  end  of 
time.  They  "sit  on  twelve  thrones,  judging 
the  twelve  tribes  of  Israel."  The  New  Testa- 
ment church  was  not  a  new  church,  but  a  con- 
tinuation of  the  old  under  new  forms  and 
with  additional  privileges.  By  uniting  with 
it,  Gentiles  became  the  children  of  Abraham. 

The  following  admonition  derives  all  its  force 
from  this  consideration  : — "  Boast  not  against 
the  branches ;  .  .  .  .  thou  bearest  not  the  root, 

but  the  root  thee If  thou  wert  cut  out 

of  the  olive-tree  which  is  wild  by  nature,  and 
wert  graffed  contrary  to  nature  into  a  good 
olive-tree ;  how  much  more  shall  these,  which 
be  the  natural  branches,  be  graffed  into  their 
own  olive-tree?  For  I  would  not,  brethren, 
that  ye  should  be  ignorant  of  this  mystery, 
lest  ye  should  be  wise  in  your  own  conceits, 
that  blindness  in  part  has  happened  to  Israel, 
until  the  fulness  of  the  Gentiles  be  come  in. 
And  so  all  Israel  shall  be  saved :  as  it  is  writ- 
ten, There  shall  come  out  of  Zion  the  Deliverer, 
and  shall  turn  away  ungodliness  from  Jacob." 


Isaac's  patrimony.  317 

The  Gentile,  in  common  with  the  Jew,  by 
faith  inherits  the  righteousness  of  faith.  This 
righteousness  was  not  a  political  or  a  patri- 
monial, hut  a  spiritual,  blessing.  It  did  not 
entitle  the  Gentile  to  the  Holy  Land.  But  the 
Jew,  having  been  excluded  from  it  as  a  just 
severity  against  his  unbelief,  returns  to  his 
normal  state  in  it,  when,  by  his  faith,  he  is 
restored  to  divine  favour. 

In  harmony  with  this  view,  his  blindness  is 
represented  as  partial,  not  perpetual.  "  Blind- 
ness in  part  has  happened  to  Israel,  until  the 
fulness  of  the  Gentiles  be  come  in."  It  is 
partial,  temporary,  and  must  cease  at  the  ap- 
pointed time.  But  his  blindness  and  his  exile 
are  to  cease  together. 

I  need  not  here  repeat,  but  simply  call  to 
mind,  what  I  have  already  said  in  the  previous 
chapter  on  the  down-treading  of  the  land  of 
Canaan  for  a  limited  period.  It  sustains  the 
position  now  taken. 

Other  Scriptures  suggest  with  equal  clear- 
ness this  twofold  restoration.  The  institutions 
of  the  Jews  were  none  of  them  conventional. 
Their  entire  polity  was  theocratical  throughout. 
All  authority,  office,  law,  worship,  and  all  the 
forms  of  either,  were  from  Heaven,  not  of  men. 
This  made  all  Palestine,  in  all  parts  of  it, 

27* 


318  ISHMAEL  AND   THE   CHURCH. 

ultimately  dependencies  of  Jerusalem,  in  which 
city  the  theocratical  king  resided,  and  the 
high-priest  officiated  as  the  divinely-appointed 
president  of  the  sanhedrim.  To  Jerusalem 
the  tribes  went  up  not  only  to  worship,  but 
for  justice  and  for  the  ultimate  determination 
of  controversies. 

Hence,  Jerusalem  came  to  be  the  place  of 
trial  and  of  execution, — the  spot  more  stained 
than  any  other  with  the  blood  of  legalized 
murder.  In  the  twenty-third  chapter  of  Mat- 
thew, from  verse  23,  our  Lord  first  addresses 
the  scribes  and  Pharisees,  the  men  in  power, 
denounces  their  hypocrisies,  frauds,  and  mal- 
versations; and  then  he  continues: — "Behold, 
I  send  unto  you  prophets,  and  wise  men,  and 
scribes :  and  some  of  them  ye  shall  kill  and 
crucify;  and  some  of  them  shall  ye  scourge  in 
your  synagogues,  and  persecute  them  from  city 
to  city :  that  upon  you  may  come  all  the  right- 
eous  blood  shed   upon  the  earth 0 

Jerusalem,  Jerusalem,  thou  that  killest  the 
prophets,  and  stonest  them  which  are  sent 
unto  thee,  how  often  would  I  have  gathered 
thy  children  together,  even  as  a  hen  gathereth 
her  chickens  under  her  wings,  and  ye  would 
not!  Behold,  your  house  is  left  unto  you 
desolate.    For  I  say  unto  you,  Ye  shall  not 


Isaac's  patrimony.  319 

see  me  henceforth  till  ye  shall  say,  Blessed  is 
he  that  cometh  in  the  name  of  the  Lord." 

The  terms  "Jerusalem"  and  "generation," 
though  not  precisely  synonymous,  comprehend 
the  same  commonwealth: — "generation"  com- 
prising the  people  that  compose  it,  "  Jerusalem," 
the  same  people  under  an  organized  government. 

That  our  Lord  here  addresses  the  Hebrews 
as  a  national  unity  is  also  evident  from  the 
wide  range  over  which  his  weeping  eye  passes 
as  he  takes  in  the  affecting  estimate  of  their 
guilt.  The  shadowy  past  rises  up  in  the  dis- 
tinct recollection  of  its  long-forgotten  events. 

The  Jewish  character  had  ever  been  the 
same.  The  perverseness  which  now  oppressed 
him  was  that  with  which  he  had  long  been  fami- 
liar. "  How  often  would  I  have  gathered  thy 
children  together,  as  a  hen  gathereth  her  chick- 
ens under  her  wings  !"  How  she  sits  and  calls 
her  young,  and  tenderly  chides  delay,  and 
shelters  them  from  the  cold,  and  exposes  her- 
self, all  uncomplaining,  through  the  weary  day 
and  livelong  night,  to  the  dew,  the  wind,  the 
rain  and  driving  sleet,  to  save  and  rear  them ! 
Even  so,  as  a  hen  gathereth  and  cherisheth  her 
brood,  have  I  sought  and  cherished  thee.  Amid 
the  woes  of  bondage,  in  the  mortar-beds  of 
Egypt,  and  in  the  wilderness  forty  years  long, 


320  ISHMAEL   AND   THE  CHURCH. 

and  in  Canaan,  how  often  would  I  have 
gathered  thee,  and  by  the  river  of  Babylon  for 
seventy  years.  And,  during  the  last  three  years, 
how  often  in  long  nights  of  prayer,  on  lonely 
mountains,  or  amid  shame  and  spitting  till 
reproach  hath  broken  my  heart,  and  ye  would 
not! 

He  also  glances  down  upon  the  dark  and 
guilty  future,  and  cries,  "  Behold,  I  send  unto 
you  prophets,  and  wise  men,  and  scribes  :  and 
some  of  them  ye  shall  kill  and  crucify;  and 
some  of  them  ye  shall  scourge  in  your  streets, 
and  persecute  them  from  city  to  city." 

Thus,  in  this  vision  of  their  guilt,  their 
character  for  evil  had  been  uniform ;  it  clave 
to  their  very  being  as  a  people.  The  dying 
cadences  of  their  past  ingratitude  were  even 
now  mingling  with  the  reproaches  of  the  pre- 
sent hour  and  evoking  most  bitter  accusations 
from  the  anticipated  crimes  of  the  future.  It 
was  evidently  a  national  character  now  so 
severely  reprehended;  and  it  was  a  national 
doom  now  so  reluctantly  pronounced. 

"  Behold,  your  house  is  left  unto  you  deso- 
late." The  house,  the  place  of  residence, 
when  left  desolate,  is  uninhabited,  dreary,  and 
falls  into  decay. 

During  most  of  the  time  for  four  hundred 


ISAAC'S  PATRIMONY.  321 

years  from  the  period  of  this  denunciation,  the 
Jews  were  banished  from  Jerusalem.  Its  walls 
and  temple,  levelled  with  the  ground,  were  left 
in  ruins. 

After  this,  Constantine  permitted  the  out- 
casts to  assemble  once  a  year  to  bewail  their 
exile  and  the  loss  of  the  beautiful  house  in 
which  their  fathers  worshipped.  It  was  pain- 
ful, even  to  a  foe,  to  see  them  at  each  return- 
ing anniversary,  clothed  in  sackcloth,  come  in 
long  processions,  sit  down  amid  broken  arches, 
subverted  walls  and  altars,  and  to  hear  the 
bitter  wail  of  the  desolate  as  it  rose  and  floated 
sadly  over  the  surrounding  ruins.  But  even 
this  poor  privilege  has  often  been  denied 
them. 

The  soil  also  has  lost  its  fertility,  or,  at  least, 
has  been  esteemed  worthless  for  agricultural 
purposes;  and,  with  every  form  of  possible 
misrule  to  discourage  industry,  it  still  lies  un- 
tilled.  "  The  grass  withereth  after  it  groweth 
up ;"  the  fig-tree  blossoms  not  as  aforetime ; 
there  is  no  fruit  in  the  vine ;  the  labour  of  the 
olive  fails ;  the  fields  yield  no  meat ;  the  flock 
is  cut  off  from  the  fold,  and  there  is  no  herd  in 
the  stall;  the  owl  roosts  on  the  forsaken  bal- 
cony; the  bat  clings  to  the  mouldering  walls. 
No  country  on  earth  within  the  same  limits 


322  ISHMAEL  AND   THE   CHURCH. 

was  ever  so  filled  with  people.  The  smallest 
villages  contained  at  least  fifteen  thousand, 
the  larger  twenty  or  thirty;  and  these  were 
quite  contiguous  to  each  other. 

A  population  of  four  millions,  according  to 
Volney,  inhabited  Judea  alone.  Out  of  one 
gate  of  its  capital  (according  to  Josephus)  six 
hundred  thousand  dead  bodies  were  carried 
during  the  siege  under  Titus,  and  at  least  a 
million  perished  on  that  occasion. 

Its  thronged  thoroughfares  have  ever  since 
been  comparatively  deserted,  its  "  cities  wasted, 
without  inhabitant,  its  houses  without  man." 
The  solid  masonry  of  its  towns  is  everywhere 
giving  way.  The  stones  are  precipitated  on  the 
inmates,  who  retire  to  other  apartments  for  a 
temporary  shelter,  and  whose  hands  are  never 
raised  to  repair  a  ruin  or  to  resist  the  progress 
of  decay. 

In  that  devoted  land,  all  social  interest,  all 
political  importance,  is  utterly  lost,  and  the 
universal  downward  tendency  cannot  be  re- 
strained. It  is  "left  desolate."  The  provi- 
dential segis  has  been  taken  off;  and  all  at- 
tempts, therefore,  from  external  sources,  to  re- 
store and  to  rebuild,  have  proved  unavailing. 
Julian,  aided  by  the  people  and  the  treasures 
of  his  empire,  abandoned  the  attempt  in  de- 


Isaac's  patrimony.  323 

spair.  Ruin  could  spoil  and  mar  and  im- 
poverish, but  no  hand  could  restore  and  build : 
the  earth  rose  up  in  Heaven's  controversy,  and 
fire-balls  drove  back  the  workmen. 

These  are  some  of  the  reasons  for  believing 
that  the  Jews  as  a  nation  are  intended  where 
it  is  said,  "Ye  shall  not  see  me  henceforth, 
till  ye  [shall  again  exist  as  ye  do  now,  and] 
shall  say,  Blessed  is  he  that  cometh  in  the  name 
of  the  Lord." 

The  Jews  then  had  a  national  existence  and 
a  country ;  since  then  they  have  had  neither. 
Outcast  from  their  own  land,  they  have  been 
dispersed  into  every  other,  and  have  been 
mostly  disfranchised  in  them  all.  They  must 
repent,  return,  and  reconstruct  their  pros- 
trated polity,  and  say,  "  Blessed  is  he  that 
cometh  in  the  name  of  the  Lord."  For  it  was 
not  the  individuals  of  that  generation  who 
were  addressed  as  such,  but  the  Hebrews  as 
they  existed  in  an  organized  state,  in  a  col- 
lective national  unity  and  responsibility ;  and  in 
this  same  capacity  are  they  to  see  by  faith  and 
acknowledge  the  Messiah. 

Zechariah  (chap.  xii.  verse  10)  represents 
the  house  of  David  and  the  inhabitants  of  Je- 
rusalem as  deeply  penitent  while  looking  on 
Him  whom  they  had  pierced.  The  same  nation, 


324      ISHMAEL  AND  THE  CHURCH. 

in  the  same  land  in  which  they  rejected  and 
murdered,  shall  see  and  adore  their  Lord. 

The  promise  also  of  a  restoration  to  the 
favour  of  God,  and  simultaneously  to  their 
own  land,  is  often  repeated.  "In  the  day" 
(says  Ezekiel,  chap,  xxxvi.)  "  that  I  shall  have 
cleansed  you  from  all  your  iniquities  I  will 
also  cause  you  to  dwell  in  the  cities,  and  the 
wastes  shall  be  builcled."  The  repentance  and 
the  return  synchronize.  The  resurrection 
(detailed  by  this  prophet  in  the  next  chapter) 
of  the  whole  house  of  Israel  makes  equally 
clear  assurance  of  the  twofold  restoration, — the 
one  to  spiritual,  the  other  to  national,  life. 

The  promise  also  which  in  the  same  chapter 
is  subjoined — to  wit :  that  they  should  never 
more  be  divided  into  two  nations,  but  ever 
after  that  event  be  and  remain  one  nation, 
under  one  king  and  shepherd — fixes  this  pre- 
dicted restoration  to  a  period  subsequent  to  the 
Christian  era,  and,  indeed,  to  our  own  times, 
since  it  has  never  yet  occurred. 

The  valley  also  seen  in  this  vision  stretches 
out  under  the  eye  of  the  prophet  to  the  horizon, 
and  is  the  vast  charnel  of  Israel's  dispersed 
generations.  Like  the  bones  of  an  immense 
and  fallen  army,  separated  the  one  from  the 
other,  and  promiscuously  scattered  over  the 


ISAAC'S   PATRIMONY.  325 

plain,  so  had  Israel  lost  home  and  country, 
political  and  ecclesiastical  life,  ruler  and  priest, 
law  and  altar;  and,  in  the  dissolution  of  all 
the  bonds  of  a  living  commonwealth,  they 
were  found  scattered  into  every  kingdom,  and 
without  a  resting-place  in  any; — among  foes 
who,  while  they  refused  them  organized  life, 
protected  them  at  the  same  time  from  exter- 
mination; who,  while  they  repressed  among 
them  every  effort  to  reconstruct  their  ruined 
nationality,  refused  also  interment  to  its  bones. 
The  resurrection  takes  place  where  the  bones 
lie  scattered ;  the  restoration  follows. 

"If,"  says  Paul,  "the  casting  away  of  them 
be  the  reconciling  of  the  world,  what  shall  the 
receiving  of  them  be  but  life  from  the  dead  ?" 
Both  events  are  operative.  The  casting  away 
is  the  reconciling  of  the  world;  the  receiving 
of  them,  life  from  the  dead. 

The  original  grant  to  Abraham  and  to  his 
posterity  has  never  yet  fully  come  into  their 
possession.  That  grant  extended  from  the 
entering-in  of  Hamath  the  Great,  (far  north  of 
any  territory  ever  yet  occupied  by  them,)  to 
the  river  of  Egypt, — a  limit  far  south  of  any  of 
their  former  possessions.  It  was  also  to  extend, 
from  west  to  east,  from  the  foot  of  the  Medi- 
terranean  to    the    Euphrates.     David    made 

28 


26       ISHMAEL  AND  THE  CnUECH. 


most  of  this  whole  country  tributary;  but  Israel 
never  occupied  it,  never  filled  it  from  limit  to 
limit  with  men  like  a  flock.  A  part  of  the 
Holy  Land  has  been  very  densely  settled;  but 
the  remainder  has  ever  been  in  the  possession 
of  others. 

The  land  also  evidently  awaits  the  return 
of  its  children.  The  materials  for  constructing 
cities,  dwellings,  terraces,  causeways,  bridges, 
are  all  on  the  ground,  ready  to  rise  out  of  the 
heaps  of  rubbish  and  to  subserve  all  the  pur- 
poses of  the  restored  community.  The  soil 
so  long  untilled  has  been  drinking  in  fer- 
tility from  the  dew  of  heaven,  and  is  now  more 
capable  than  ever  of  sustaining  an  immense 
population.  Down-trodden  and  desolate,  it 
mourns  the  absence  of  its  rightful  cultivators, 
and  refuses  to  yield  its  increase  to  the  hands 
of  aliens. 

Its  expatriated  heirs  are  likewise  without  a 
home  or  a  country  elsewhere,  and  who,  as  the 
world's  bankers  and  merchants,  can,  on  the 
shortest  notice,  when  the  way  is  prepared, 
gratify  their  long-cherished  desire  to  return. 

The  obstruction  also  at  the  present  time  in 
their  way  in  Europe  and  Asia  is  alread}^  fallen 
into  the  processes  of  a  fatal  decay.  Lshmael, 
smitten  with  decline  and  consumption,  cannot 


Isaac's  patrimony.  327 

long  retain  the  sceptre  or  the  sword.  His  eye 
waxes  dim;  untoward  events  surprise  him; 
the  angel  of  the  bottomless  pit,  who  opened 
for  him  the  cave  of  Hara,  is  now  opening  for 
him  the  gates  of  death ;  the  pestilential  damps 
of  the  Crimea  and  of  the  Bosphorus  are  but 
the  margins  of  that  dark  cloud  hanging  in 
deadly  wreaths  over  every  centre  of  life  in 
his  doomed  and  perishing  being.  What  then, 
within  a  brief  period,  will  there  be  to  hinder 
Israel's  return  ? 

This  great  event, — oh !  how  desirable,  since 
it  is  linked  with  the  world's  salvation ! — it  shall 
be  life  from  the  dead.  Then  "many  people 
shall  go  and  say,  Come  ye,  and  let  us  go  up 
to  the  mountain  of  the  Lord,  to  the  house 
of  the  God  of  Jacob;  and  he  will  teach  of  his 
ways,  and  we  will  walk  in  his  paths;"  then 
shall  sectional  animosities  and  the  wars  of  un- 
congenial races  cease,  swords  be  beaten  into 
ploughshares,  and  spears  into  pruning-hooks, 
fierce  men  loose  their  destructive  propensities, 
and  a  renovated  world  resound  with  the  melo- 
dies of  Zion  and  the  songs  of  the  reaper. 

Egypt  has  become  the  basest  of  kingdoms ; 
the  beauty  of  the  Chaldees'  excellency  is  as 
when  God  overthrew  Sodom  and  Gomorrah. 
Persia  and  Greece,  loosed  from  their  founda- 


328  ISHMAEL   AND   THE   CHURCH. 

tions  by  Ishmael,  are  afloat  at  all  uncertainties 
in  a  sea  which  is  itself  soon  to  waste  away  in 
its  own  dissolving  bed.  Rome  rises  but  to  fall ; 
while,  amid  the  ruins  of  despairing  nations,  Zion 
rises  to  fall  no  more. 


'See  thy  bright  altars  throng' d  with  prostrate  kings, 
And  heap'd  with  products  of  Sabean  springs ! 
For  thee  Idume's  spicy  forests  blow, 
And  seeds  of  gold  in  Ophir's  mountains  glow. 
See  heaven  his  sparkling  portals  wide  display, 
And  break  upon  thee  in  a  flood  of  day ! 
No  more  the  rising  sun  shall  gild  the  morn, 
Nor  evening  Cynthia  fill  her  silver  horn ; 
But  lost,  dissolved  in  thy  superior  rays, 
One  tide  of  glory,  one  unclouded  blaze, 
O'erflow  thy  courts :  the  Light  himself  shall  shine 
Reveal'd,  and  God's  eternal  day  be  thine. 
The  seas  shall  waste,  the  skies  in  smoke  decay, 
Rocks  fall  to  dust,  and  mountains  melt  away  ; 
But,  fix'd  his  word,  his  saving  power  remains : 
Thy  realm  forever  lasts  ;  thine  own  Messiah  reigns. 

Pope's  Messiah. 


THE   END. 


STEREOTYPED   BT   L.   JOHNSON   AJND  CO. 
PHILADELPHIA. 


Date  Due 

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